Dude, where’s my Y chromosome?
by Pickman's Secret
Summary: Urahara loves his practical jokes, but he's never managed to pull one on Ichigo. After accidentally going too far in order to surprise Ichigo, the young Shinigami ends up with two big problems that are sure to ruin his life as he knows it.
1. Chapter 1: Practical Joke

**Author's Comments:** This fic is based off of an interesting hentai pic i found, i thought the pic was hilarious so i decided to make a story around it. Hope you enjoy it!

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Urahara Kisuke loved his jokes. He loved to break the stifling seriousness of a situation with a well timed prank or a joking comment that was guaranteed to make people laugh. And by people he meant himself. Much to his disappointment his jokes often went over the heads of those around him, but that didn't matter, as long as he got a giggle out of it the whole thing wasn't completely wasted.

His favourite of all japes was of course, practical jokes. The planning, the anticipation of a trap timely sprung, and of course, the frantic curses aimed in his general direction by his unwitting victims.

Kisuke knew all the good practical jokes, such as the classic bucket of spiders perched on a door that was slightly ajar, the daring ten thousand volt electric toilet seat, exploding bubblegum, captured Hollow in the closet, and the infamous combustible shoe liners, which of course, were his own invention, but for all these side splitting pranks and the many victims who had fallen foul of them (although it completely puzzled him as to why they didn't find them as funny as he did) there was one person he had never managed to get.

Kurosaki Ichigo.

Sure Kisuke was always winding up Ichigo and poking fun at him, or even taking advantage of his irascible nature to a large degree, and one would think that Ichigo's extremely negligible ability to detect spiritual presences would make him the prime target for a practical joke, but what he lacked in spiritual awareness he made up for in good ol', garden variety paranoia.

Try as he might Urahara Kisuke could never catch Ichigo with his elaborate schemes, and the thought of someone escaping his humorous clutches, especially someone who was so serious, vexed him something rotten, and so, on this day of all days, he had decided he would get Ichigo no matter what.

"Uh… Hello?" Kurosaki Ichigo said as he poked his head through the slightly open door, as if he was afraid to step inside.

"Gooooooood Mooooorniiiiiing!" called a sing-song voice that unmistakably belonged to Urahara. No one other than him could be this cheery so early in the morning.

"Come on in, Kurosaki-kun! Come on in!" Urahara finally appeared from round a shelf, wearing the same clothes as ever, and with the same frightening grin that he always wore, "What brings you here so early?"

"You ASKED me to come here early." Ichigo couldn't help but frown as he stepped reluctantly into the store. Something didn't feel right, although it was the same feeling he always got whenever he came in here.

"So I did! So I did!" Urahara fluttered his fan as he laughed whimsically before motioning for Kurosaki to follow him into the back, "Would you like some tea?"

"No, thank you." Ichigo politely waved away his offer as he followed and sat at the small table while looking around the room. Instantly he noticed a none so subtly placed bucket full of some horrid looking green good behind a plant pot, and a pair of ominous looking goggles on the table that he couldn't help but think would be hazardous to his health if he put them on, and his foot knocked against something that felt oddly like a large spring under the table. What the hell was hat and clogs planning? Ichigo decided to go on the offensive before Urahara had a chance to do anything.

"Why did you ask me here, Urahara-san?"

Urahara poured himself a cup of green tea and looked at Ichigo with a thinner and more devious smile that made Ichigo's skin crawl, the effect almost made him miss something that glinted in the bottom of a second cup which Urahara filled with tea and pushed towards Ichigo despite his refusal.

"I thought you might want to talk about what happened yesterday. You froze during the fight against those Arrancar." Ichigo sighed despite himself as he saw how serious Urahara had become. He needed to talk about it, although he didn't think Urahara would know about it, but who else could possibly know about an inner Hollow? And so they talked as Urahara had planned, after all, it pays to have something legitimate to lure a fly into a web with, and the more they talked about serious things the less Ichigo would suspect… or at least that's what Urahara hoped.

"I'm deeply sorry Kurosaki-san, such things are beyond even my knowledge, but these Vizard maybe able help you more." Urahara smiled consolingly as Ichigo sighed and stretched, and seeing his opportunity he thrust a thin box under Ichigo's nose.

"Would you like a chocolate? Sugar's really good at helping you cheer up." Ichigo flinched backwards at the sudden appearance of the box and eyed it suspiciously.

"Er… thanks…" Urahara smiled widely at his acceptance and opened the box for him, but his smile dropped away as he saw Ichigo's face turn a little green, "I…er… think I'll pass."

"Is something the matter?" he looked into the box himself but couldn't understand what had made Ichigo refuse so suddenly.

"Oh er... Nothing, I just don't, er…. Like dark chocolate! Yeah! That's right! I er… don't like dark chocolate." Ichigo let out a small sigh of relief as Urahara seemed to buy the excuse and put the chocolates to one side. In all truthfulness dark chocolate didn't bother him, but there was something more than just a little off putting about chocolates shaped disturbingly like spiders that moved, and sweets that glow an ominous green.

"Ah well, how about some exercise to take your mind off things?" Urahara stood up and regained his grin, "Abarai-kun has kindly offered to train with you!"

Renji chose that moment to appear from round the edge of another door with an annoyed look on his face.

"I did offer, you told me that if I didn't you'd double my ch- OOF!" his sentence was interrupted by a timely jab to the solar plexus with Urahara's cane.

"Now's not the time for talking, Abarai-kun! You both need the training, now go on! Go on! Down into the training room!" Renji grumbled as he stood up, giving Urahara the evil eye and Ichigo motioned for him to go first, and he could have sworn he saw Urahara's face shift briefly into an expression of panic out of the corner of his eye, but he paid it no attention as Urahara jabbed him in the forehead knocking his soul out of his body.

"Dammit! WARN me before you do that!!" Ichigo shouted as he nearly fell down the trap door leading to the training room, but just as he recovered he nearly fell again at the sound of a scream and a hard impact from far below.

Both Ichigo and Urahara looked down the hole to see Renji lying on his back in an awkward position, looking decisively worse for wear.

"What happened to you?" called down Ichigo.

"I slipped off the ladder…" groaned Renji.

"What did you do that for?" Renji bolted up right and growled at Ichigo's reply.

"I DIDN'T DO IT ON PURPOSE, RETARD!" he stood up painfully and waved his zanpakuto angrily at Urahara who was laughing nervously, "And you, Hat-n-clogs! You should clean your store more often! That ladders greasy as hell!"

Ichigo eyed Urahara suspiciously but he refused to meet Ichigo's eye and instead he called down to Renji cheerfully.

"I believe that's your duty, Abarai-kun!" both Ichigo and Urahara quickly moved back as Renji's reply came in the form of his zanpakuto flying upwards and imbedding itself in the ceiling above where their heads had been.

"Well, it looks like Renji's all worked up and ready to train! You best go down and help him work out that frustration!" Ichigo pulled Renji's sword from the ceiling and stowed it in his sash.

"Take care of my body while I'm down there… and don't do anything weird with it." Urahara laughed nervously again in a pathetic attempt to cover up his guilt.

"Why what ever do you mean, Kurosaki-kun?" Ichigo didn't answer, instead he simply covered his hands with his sleeves and slowly began to climb down the ladder as not to fall victim to the grease.

Urahara watched him go with a grin and waved with his fan whenever Ichigo looked up until he was right at the bottom.

Kisuke bolted upright, the grin still glowing on his face as he turned and looked at Ichigo's limp body that lay in a pile on the floor.

"Time to go to work-"

"Um…" Urahara glances over his shoulder at the sound of a voice coming from the trap door.

"Urahara-san, I need you to get me out of my gig-" before he could finish his sentence Urahara looked back to Ichigo's body and dismissively thrust out his cane behind him, hitting Renji in the forehead with a zap sound, and a moment later the sound of Renji's soul hitting the ground below, closely followed by his body, and a long stream of loud curses floated up from below, but Urahara didn't pay attention to promises of pain and simply grinned at Ichigo's docile body.

"Ururu! Could you get something for me?" he called out with glee.

"What do you want me to get, Kisuke-sama?" said the sheepish girl as she ran into the room.

"Get me… my chemistry set!"

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"Its finished!" Urahara Kisuke chirped happily in a sing-song tone as he held up a test tube three quarters full with a plain white powder.

"Um… what's finished?" Jinta, clearly unimpressed with the product of Urahara's experimentation with chemicals for two hours.

"Why my amazing 'Spirit Reactive Itching Powder' of course!" Urahara smiled widely only to receive blank looks from Ururu, Jinta and Tessai.

"… Why would you make something like that?" Jinta said after a few moments of awkward silence, but Urahara's optimism seemed unphased by such a lack of understanding or interest.

"To get Kurosaki-kun with, of course! I've been trying to get him with my pranks for quite some time now, but he's just too alert to my attempts!" at this Jinta snorted and murmured to himself.

"More likely you're just crap at being subtle." Tessai gave him one of his trade mark evil glares and Jinta flinched and fell silent.

"With this powder I'll finally be able to break that serious demeanour of his and make him laugh!"

"Or make him hate you even more- OUCH!" A slap to the back of his head served to silence Jinta this time.

"Kisuke-sama…" Ururu said meekly, drawing Urahara's attention towards her with his usual comforting smile.

"Yes, Ururu?"

"Um… why make special powder? Why not just use normal itching powder?"

"Well I'm not sure how long Abarai-kun can keep Ichigo preoccupied, so if I use normal itching powder there's a risk it's effects would run out before he got back into his body, but with this the effects will only kick in a short time after a soul passes into his body!"

Jinta opened his mouth to comment again but Tessai stopped him by sitting on top of him.

Urahara hummed happily to himself for a moment or two while admiring his handy work while Jinta and Ururu manoeuvred Ichigo's body into a sitting position, and began to take his shirt off.

"What the hell are you doing?" Urahara jumped as the voice broke past his self admiration and he quickly threw the test tube into the large rack filled with other tubes before spinning around on his seat to face the trap door, and hopefully block the chemistry set from view.

"K-Kurosaki-san!" Urahara squeaked in surprise as Ichigo peered over the edge of the open trap door and stared at his body being man handled.

"Why are you taking my shirt off?" he suddenly looked to Urahara and his eyes went a bit wider, "You're not trying to molest me are you? I didn't think you went that way but now I think about it you do seem a bit fruity-"

"No no no no no!" Urahara chimed in quickly while trying to laugh it off, "It's nothing like that! I er… I just thought your clothes were a bit dirty, so I was getting Jinta and Ururu to undress you so I could wash them."

Ichigo was suspicious, but he decided to let the subject lie, "Oh… ok." Urahara seemed to sigh in relief at his acceptance, but he covered it up with a smile when Ichigo eyed him distrustfully.

"Well you don't need to bother, I'm coming up in a sec, we've finished training, I'm just going to help Renji get back into his battered gigas then I'm gonna go."

"Oh of course! We'll dress your body again while you're down there!" Ichigo was reluctant to leave his body in Urahara's hands for a second longer, but much to the shop keeper's relief he eventually went back down the ladder.

Urahara quickly turned back to the test tube, realising he only had a minute or so to execute his prank, but as he looked back at the table he suddenly realised that he'd put the test tube into the rack with thirty or so other test tubes, quite a few of which were filled with varying levels of white powder.

"Hmmm… I should really start adding colouring to some of these…" frantically Urahara began to search through the test tubes, and eventually the decision boiled down to two of them. He looked between the two repeatedly until he heard the sound of footsteps on the ladder, unlike last time, and he sniffed each tube, hoping to gain something from them.

"I think it's this one!" he said, throwing the other back into the rack and clambering over to Ichigo's half disrobed body.

"What's all that noise up there?" Ichigo called up the ladder after hearing the scuffle Urahara was having getting over to his body, "I better be dressed again when I get up there!"

Kisuke quickly poured some of the test tube onto his Ichigo's chest and he watched as the powder hit his skin and disappeared, then after a moment he decided 'what the heck!' and poured the rest of it on for good measure.

Urahara heard Ichigo's hand touch the floor mat and he hastily tried to wrestle his shirt back into place, but as he did he fell over onto it in a heap. Before he could straighten up he noticed a shadow fall across him.

"What the hell do you think you're doing, you pervert?"

"Dressing you?" Urahara said weakly under the burning gaze of Ichigo.

"I'm going…" grumbled Ichigo as he rotated his shoulders and straightened his shirt, while Urahara nursed the throbbing red footprint on his forehead.

"Thank you! Come again any time, Kurosaki-san!" he looked up as Ichigo side stepped through the slightly open door that led into the shop proper and he cursed inwardly. By not opening the door more Ichigo had not knocked the bucket of goo onto himself that Kisuke had set up on top of the door as a contingency.

Once Ichigo was far enough away from the store Urahara, Jinta, Ururu and Tessai shot to the door and all looked through the gap to watch Ichigo walk down the street.

"Any second now…" Urahara said in anticipation while Ichigo walked away, looking distinctly non-itchy.

"Any second…" he was getting further away, and still no itching.

"Any time now…" Urahara stared through a pair of binoculars which he had produced from god knows where and watched the unperturbed Ichigo disappear round the corner.

"Hmmm… I don't understand! He should have been itching like crazy by now."

Urahara went back into the back room and sat down with a sigh.

"I've failed again! Why can I never get him with my pranks?" Kisuke latched onto a surprised and battered looking Renji who had finally dragged himself out of the training room, and began to wail as he held on to the red head.

"W-what the hell are you doing, you freaky old man?" Renji managed to pry Urahara off him and sat down at the table.

"Ah well! I'll just have to be even MORE cunning!" Renji couldn't help but wince at how quickly Urahara had regained his usual optimism and sighed.

"No one would ever fall for your stupid pranks, they're too obvious!" as he said that Renji noticed the chocolates left open on the table, "Oooo! Chocolates! Can I?" before anyone could give him permission he began to stuff his face with them.

"Hey, what do these do?" Renji picked up the odd looking goggles from the table and places them over his eyes, "OUCH! What the hell?? These sweets are burning my mouth! It feels like there's flaming spiders in there!" quickly he reached over and crabbed the cup of cold tea that Urahara had poured for Ichigo some hours before and downed it in one, only to emit another yell as Urahara watched curiously.

"A RASHOR BADE?! (A razor blade?!) WHO DA HEH PUHS A RASHOR BADE IN HEA?! (Who the hell puts a razor blade in tea?!)" At that very moment the goggles over his eyes began to emit a disturbing whine that grew in pitch, but before he knew what was going on, the goggles flashed like a sun going super nova and made Renji scream again.

"I'M BHIND!" spasming in pain he kicked out, one leg landed on the table and one hit the spring under it, making the whole surface slam upwards and catapult him through the air, and through the ajar door, making the bucket fall down and cover him in horrific green goo.

"WHAH DA HEH IS DIS SHUFF?! IH'S 'URNING MAH CLOVES!" soon the chemicals that had been on the table followed him and the test tubes shattered on impact, and another scream issued forth from the brutalised red head as the chemicals combusted the green goo.

"Well… at least we know those work!" said Urahara with a smile while Ururu and Jinta hurriedly fetched a fire extinguisher.

Ichigo grumbled constantly on his way home, his body just hadn't felt right since he left Urahara's shop. Each limb felt like it was made of wood.

"What the hell did that perverted old man do to me?" the site of Urahara leaning over his half naked body had made his skin crawl, and try as he might he couldn't help but think of what he might have done.

"I hope he doesn't think I swing that way…"

By the time Ichigo got home he felt more tired than he had ever been in his life, and something told him that it wasn't because of the training he had done with Renji, something else was affecting him and sapping his strength.

When he got through the front door his arms and legs felt like lumps of lead, and his head swam with the effort of standing up. His sisters greeted him at the door, but for some reason he couldn't make sense of what they said.

"Going… bed…" was all he managed to force himself to say as he shakily caught hold of the banister and tried to drag himself upstairs. If only he could get into bed he felt that everything would be ok, all he needed was sleep, but he couldn't do it, his body was too heavy for his muscles to lift and the stairs came rushing up to meet him, but before he could hit them he felt hands grab him and lift him. It must have been his dad, but darkness took his vision before he could turn to look at him, and unconsciousness soon followed.

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"N-NO MORE GIRAFFES!" shouted Ichigo as he woke with a start and flailed around. He rubbed his head after a moment and yawned while trying to shake off the grogginess of sleep. He looked around at his alarm clock and saw it was 7am, and two days had passed since he had been to Urahara's shop.

"Oh man, what the hell was I dreaming about?" Ichigo winced and rubbed his throat, his voice sounded weird and his throat hurt, and for some reason his Adam's apple seemed to have lessened considerably, maybe he was ill? That'd explain why he'd collapsed on the stairs and why he felt so groggy.

"What the hell did that old pervert do to me?" he threw back the sheets and swung his legs out of bed, but as he stood up quickly his head swam and he lost his balance, making him fall back onto his bed with a resigned sigh. He closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath, but it was hard to breathe, like his chest was heavy. If Urahara had made him ill and prevented him from training he'd kill him.

He stood again, but slowly this time and shuffled lethargically out of his bedroom and down the hall to the bathroom, trying to shake the light floaty feeling in his limbs as he went.

As he locked the door and turned to towards the toilet he jumped back with a start as he saw a figure in front of him, and then jumped again as he realised what he was looking at.

"TATSUKI?!" he exclaimed in a voice that was embarrassingly high pitched for a guy, "Why the hell are you in my house? And why are you half naked-" Ichigo stopped mid sentence and rubbed his eyes before looking again. No, it couldn't be Tatsuki, sure the breasts looked around about the same size, but she was shorter and despite being similarly spiky her hair… wasn't… orange…

Ichigo's heart began to beat faster in his chest as realisation dawned on him.

It wasn't someone else stood in front of him, it was a mirror.

A tremendous high pitched scream erupted from the Kurosaki house hold that morning, making dogs bark for blocks around, and birds scatter from trees, and following the scream where the words:

"WHAT THE HELL DID THAT PERVERTED OLD MAN DO TO ME?!"


	2. Chapter 2: A New Daughter

**Author's Notes: **This chapter was only meant to be HALF of Chapter 2, but I've got a bad habit of writing far too much. Ah well, gives me something ready made for Chapter 3! As always, Thanks to Von Doomsatan for the help.

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Ichigo stared in the mirror in abject horror, his…er… her face was a mask of stunned terror as the gears of her brain started to slowly turn again and tried to make sense of what was going on.

'_What happened while I was unconscious for two days?' _he thought to himself._ 'Why am I shorter? Why are my boxers falling down? AND WHY THE HELL DO I HAVE BOOBS?!"_

She fought her panicked breathing in an attempt to calm down, and also to stop her boobs from bouncing disturbingly in the mirror.

"What the hell am I going to do?" Ichigo whimpered unnaturally as her mind worked hard to find a solution to the problem at hand, but a rhythmic pounding sound caught her attention at the edge of her hearing and was quickly growing louder and louder.

"What the-" before she could finish her sentence the door exploded off its hinges and a hollering mass came cannoning through the ragged hole left behind. Ichigo yelped and leapt out of the way, ending up stood in the empty bath as she looked down at the wreckage of the door.

"YUZU? KARIN? RUKIA? I heard a scream, what's wrong?! Do not be afraid, for now your mighty dad has come to defend you with his amazing physique!!!"

Ichigo could do nothing other that stare in shock and confusion at her father who stood atop the defeated door, posing like some kind of cheesy super-hero.

Isshin looked around after a few moments of silence, as if he expected one of his three daughters to run to him shouting 'My hero!' but instead found a new girl in front of him, and much to his surprise and pleasure she was too stunned to cover her chest.

"Are you with my son?" he said with a grin and gave a thumb up, "He definitely knows how to pick a cute one! I'm so happy; my son has finally become a man!"

Ichigo snapped out of her shocked paralysis as the eccentric fast paced action of the last few moments finally caught up with her, and quickly wrapped her arms across her chest when she realised her dad was staring. Ichigo's face turned to an expression of thunderous rage as she leapt from the bath and drop kicked her dad in the head with full force, sending him bouncing off the wall and back into the hallway.

"Stop staring! I AM your son, you perverted old man!"

Isshin looked at Ichigo as she blushed in embarrassment and anger, and blinked in utter confusion, but much to Ichigo's dismay her father's twisted logic beat her to any kind of explanation and he immediately stared at her with an overly dramatic look of shock.

"Ichigo??? I-is this why you've been disappearing so often? Yes… yes it is… I know I should have kept a closer eye on you. Am I such a bad father as not to notice before now?" All anger faded as Ichigo was once more confounded by her father's seemingly random train of thought.

"Er… what?"

"All this time you've kept going missing? All this secretiveness. All these absences from school. You were working weren't you?" Ichigo tried to open her mouth but her father cut her off as he began to cry like a cheesy soap opera star, "No no! There's no need to speak! I understand… all this time, you've been working to raise money for… a sex change!"

Ichigo blinked a few times as the process of her father's crap logic came to its disappointing end, and once again she found her rage building up to be fired at her dad.

"What the hell kind of father assumes that kind of thing about their son?! I've not had a sex change! I don't know what the hell happened. I just woke up like this!"

Just when Ichigo thought things were bad enough another door opened up and Karin and Yuzu came out of their room.

"What the hell are you two doing making so much noise so…early…" Karin trailed off as she suddenly noticed the orange haired, half naked girl in the hall in front of her dad, "Who are you?"

"I…er…" Ichigo had forgotten that her sisters were in and their sudden appearance and the rising awareness of her lack of clothing made her throat tighten in embarrassment.

"Yuzu! Karin! Your brother has had a sex change! He's your new sister!" Isshin chirped in, tears of joy rolling down his cheeks.

"STOP SPREADING YOUR LIES!" Ichigo roared and drop kicked her father again for good measure.

Ichigo had managed to escape the barrage of frustrating questions and comments for a bit by locking herself in her room and getting dressed, which was frustrating in itself as none of her guy clothes fitted her smaller frame now, and the smallest t-shirts she owned were too loose in places and too tight on her newly acquired assets. She managed to tighten a belt just tight enough to keep up a pair of jeans and her boxers, although she had to roll up the legs of her jeans quite a bit as not to let them trip her, and much to her annoyance the most comfortable top she had was a button up shirt that stretched the buttons around the chest a bit, and threatened to show off a bit too much cleavage.

A knock came at the door just as she finished buttoning her shirt and with a sigh Ichigo sat on her bed and said, "Come in."

After a hesitant second the door opened a tiny bit and Yuzu poked her head round the edge as if afraid that Ichigo would leap over and attack her.

"Um… Ichi-nee…" Yuzu said timidly as she stepped in a bit further with a tray of breakfast, "I... I thought you might want something to eat." Ichigo was about to make an excuse when she suddenly realised that she'd been asleep for two days, and she was famished.

Yuzu came over when Ichigo waved her in and she sat down on the bed next to her and watched her new sister stuff the food down her throat with the lack of manners only men can manage.

"Um… Ichi-nee…" Yuzu managed after a long while of the only sound being that of Ichigo trying to choke down as much food in one go as she could, "Uh huh?" Ichigo managed through a mouthful of food.

"Um… um… WHY DID YOU HAVE TO GO AND GET AN OPERATION TO BE A GIRL!?! WHY DID YOU LET SOMEONE CUT OFF YOUR MANHOOD WITH A KNIFE?!"

Ichigo nearly choked as the sudden outburst came totally unexpectedly and nearly killed her with its abruptness.

"Why the hell are you taking HIS side?! Don't you know he has no idea what the hell he's talking about???"

"Nonsense!" came a scoff at the door as Isshin strutted in, "Don't worry Ichigo, I understand your situation completely, many was the time when I'd look through your mother's clothes while she was out and tried on her stockings to see what they feel like while dancing. All that bothers me is that you felt like you couldn't come to me about this before you went and let a lesser doctor take their filthy knife to your family jewels!"

"S-shut up! I don't want to know about your perversion, you filthy old man! And I didn't come to you because I didn't plan this! I just woke up like this!"

Isshin walked over to the bed and Yuzu got up so he could sit down next to Ichigo, and suddenly Ichigo realised that her dad was holding an acoustic guitar.

"Why have you-" she said in confusion but Isshin cut her off as he swung it up onto his knee and briefly hugged Ichigo.

"I understand that now is a very emotionally confusing time for you, so I thought I'd sing you a song which kept me going when _I_ had troubles."

Suddenly he started strumming and Ichigo was amazed to find that he could actually play in tune, although he wasn't sure what the tune was.

"We were at the beach…. Everyone wore, matching towels! Somebody went under a dock, and there they saw a rock… but it wasn't a rock… it was a Rock Lobster!" Ichigo blinked in utter disbelief as her father started to sway side to side, making 'aaaaah' sounds at a horrifically high pitch.

"Rock lobster! ROCK LOBSTER!" the music suddenly stopped and he patted Ichigo on the shoulder and smiled, "Yeah, you're gonna be ok." And without another word he walked out of the room, leaving Yuzu and Ichigo staring blankly at the space where their father had just been sat.

"What… the hell… just happened?" Ichigo managed after a moment.

After snapping out of her own dazed stupor Yuzu left Ichigo's room without another word, leaving Ichigo to her own thoughts.

"What the hell am I going to do?" she muttered to herself as she flopped back onto her bed and stared up at the ceiling.

"You shouldn't lie like that in that shirt, I can see right up it." Ichigo bolted up right as he realised his door was open, and with a mix of shock and relief he realised that it was Rukia that had spoken.

"I was wondering when you'd show yourself. Although I'm surprised that you didn't join in the 'circus' before." Rukia closed the door behind her and sat in the chair at Ichigo's desk.

"I was going to go out and ask what was going on, but when I heard the cause of the commotion I decided to hang back and wait till you were alone, I figured you were having a hard enough time." Ichigo was surprised by the odd show of consideration by Rukia, usually she'd be the first to join in on such a farce and wind Ichigo up even more.

"Well…er… thanks, I'm glad that you hung back, this has turned out to be one hell of a day so far."

"So… why'd you have the operation?"

"I THOUGHT YOU WERE ON MY SIDE?!" Ichigo snapped as Rukia grinned widely and chuckled.

"I'm joking, I'm joking! I know better than to trust your dad's view on things, so, what DID happen?" Ichigo sighed heavily and flopped back on the bed and told Rukia about the odd goings on at Urahara's shop and about all the booby-traps that he had set up, and how he'd forced Renji to train with Ichigo.

"And when I came back up he was doing something with my body. At first I thought he was just being fruity, but now that I have these!" she grabbed her boobs to angrily emphasise the point, "I reckon he did something more than just touch me up…" Ichigo thought for a moment, "Although I do think he was groping me as well…"

Ichigo looked back to Rukia and saw her staring at Ichigo's chest, making her feel extremely self conscious again.

"W-what are you staring at?" realising she was being talked to again, Rukia snapped out of her contemplations.

"Huh? What?"

"Were you staring at my chest?" Ichigo subconsciously crossed her arms over her new boobs.

"Don't be ridiculous!" Rukia laughed nervously and waved dismissively, "Why would I be staring at your boobs?"

"I don't know, why WOULD you be?" Ichigo narrowed her eyes as Rukia turned her face away with a huffing sound and a stern look.

"I have no reason to be staring at your boobs, its not like I'm jealous or anything."

Ichigo blinked in surprise, "You're jealous? Why the hell would you be jealous??? Do you think its fun for me to have my gender messed around with?!"

Seeing the anger in Ichigo's eyes building, Rukia decided to do some serious back peddling.

"Of course not! Plus, I never said I was jealous! You're just jumping to conclusions! I'd never be jealous of someone who got turned into a girl and got better boobs than me-" all of a sudden she realised she'd said too much and froze as Ichigo appeared to go through half a dozen emotions in a second while blushing bright pink.

"I… you… I've had my life turned on its head, and all you can think about is how that old pervert gave me bigger boobs than you?!?"

"Well can you BLAME me for being jealous?! Look at those! They're perfect!" just to emphasise her point she unceremoniously grabbed Ichigo's breasts, making her go an even brighter shade of pink, "Why couldn't he have put some of those on my gigas?!"

"GET THE HELL OFF ME!" Ichigo snapped, scaring Rukia back into her seat, "I'm going to go back to Urahara and get him to reverse this, but only after I've beat seven shades of shit out of him." Ichigo ground her fist into her other hand and grinned sadistically as she thought of pile driving him through the trap door in his shop.

"I'll come with you, I can't let a travesty such as this go on!" said Rukia jumping to her feet.

"Er… you ARE talking about him making me into a girl, and not him giving me bigger boobs, right?"

"Yeah yeah yeah, of course." She said a little too quickly for Ichigo's liking.

"Lead on!" she said chirpily and Ichigo marched out of his bedroom in front of her.

"Dammit!" she whispered, "Even his butt is cuter than mine!"

"What was that?" Ichigo rounded on her.

"Oh, nothing! Nothing!"

Just as they were about to go out of the front door, Ichigo's dad charged at them and skidded to a halt beside them in a begging position.

"Ichigo! Your sisters and I have been talking, and we've decided that we want you to go back to being a man, and if you agree then we'll even pay for the reversal!"

"Trust me, nothing would make me happier," Ichigo tried to contain her inner rage, and failed miserably, "but for the last time, I DID NOT HAVE AN OPERATION!"

"My poor son's mind is all mixed up! The emotional stress you must be under!" Isshin suddenly ripped open his shirt, "Come and press yourself to your father's mighty chest and allow him to draw out your pain with my amazingness!"

One drop kick later and Ichigo's father was in a tangle in the remains of the couch.

"Rukia, can't you do anything? They'll drive me insane if they carry on like this! And its gonna take even more explaining when I come back as a guy again." Rukia thought for a moment or two and then a light bulb seemed to turn on inside of her head.

"Ah ha! Wait here!" she said before dashing back upstairs, leaving Ichigo very confused, and a few moments later she ran back down holding an odd little stick device.

"What's that?" Ichigo said looking at the object curiously.

"How ironic that you don't remember. Its my memory wiper!" with a click purple mist erupted from the device and filled the living room, leaving them all coughing until they found their way to the windows and managed to open them up to let the purple mist out.

"Oops cough I've never used this in an enclosed cough space before."

Ichigo muttered complainingly as she tried to waft more of the smoke out of the window. As it cleared she noticed her sisters and dad. All of them had a blank expression on their faces.

"What's up with them?" she asked as Rukia stowed the stick in her pocket.

"Oh, this usually happens, they'll be stunned for a short time while the memory wiper makes up a new memory for them." Ichigo suddenly remembered the one or two other times he'd seen the device used and winced at the thought of the kind of weird stuff the gas gave them to replace their lost memories.

Suddenly Ichigo's family blinked as each one came back to the land of the living with a temporary look of bafflement on their faces.

"I wonder what it's made them remember." Whispered Ichigo as she moved to stand beside Rukia.

"It looks like we're about to find out."

Isshin looked up from his uncomfortable position amongst the debris of the couch and stared at Ichigo in confusion.

"Uhhh… do I know you?"

"Dad! What are you saying? Don't you remember?" Yuzu chipped in, "This is your niece four times removed, Ichiko!"

Ichigo stole a glance at Rukia and mouthed, 'Ichiko?'

"Sometimes the memory replacer isn't very imaginative. Just go along with it."

"She's staying over for while, while Ichigo goes to stay with relatives till the new year. Do you _ever_ pay attention, old man?" said Karin as she went off into the kitchen to get something to eat, suddenly bored with the goings on in the living room.

"Ah! Now I remember! It's amazing how you can be Ichigo's twin despite being so distantly related. Nice to meet you!" Isshin dug his way out of the couch and walked over to shake _'Ichiko's'_ hand.

"Er… hey…" Ichigo said in a way that was a bit too manly, prompting an elbow to the ribs by Rukia.

"Play along or else I'll have to wipe them again!" she hissed in his ear.

"H-hi! It's nice to meet you, Isshin-oji-san, thanks for letting me stay." Ichigo felt a little bit of her manliness die inside as she tried to be a bit more feminine in her mannerisms, and wrapped up the introductions as quick as she could so she could escape from the house along with Rukia.

Once they'd gotten out of sight of the house Ichigo rested against a lamp post and sighed in relief.

"Thank god we're out of there." She said and looked at Rukia, "It looks like I'm being 'Ichiko' for a while then."

"It could have been worse."

"True…" Ichigo thought for a moment and shook her head, "What the hell was with that story? Niece four times removed who happens to be my identical twin? Jesus… it sounds like the kind of crappy excuse that only appears in cheesy fanfictions."

"Well, at least its better than some of the other memories its made up, and at lease its something we can work with easily, it shouldn't be too hard going along with it until Urahara can turn you back to normal."

"Yeah… speaking of that old pervert, we best get going." 'Ichiko' said with gritted teeth, "That bastard's going to pay for playing around with my manhood!"

Ichiko's vengeful pose and words lost all their credibility as Rukia started to snicker behind him, and she suddenly realised what she just said.

"Hehehe, Playing with your manhood."

Ichiko sighed in frustration.

"Shut up! This is going to be a long day…"


	3. Chapter 3: Excuses, Excuses

**Author's Notes: **Sorry for posting this up later than I said to some of you I would, but I got writers block :\ But its here now so all is well and I hope you enjoy!

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Kurosaki Ichiko was not a happy bunny. Many factors had served to drive Ichiko to boiling point, such as having woken up to find that she was light between the legs and heavy in the chest, then being caught out by her father's overactive imagination, then having Rukia's memory wiper turn an awkward father-son moment into the story line from a bad soap opera, and then finally remembering that all this had been caused by a certain freaky shop keeper who had gotten a little too familiar with his abandoned body.

So, to say that Kurosaki Ichiko was not a happy bunny did not do the situation justice.

The wrath of Mount Vesuvius was like a faltering roman candle compared to the rage that welled within the furious fledgling female.

To top it all off Ichiko's natural paranoid had only been heightened by the current predicament, and so to avoid being seen by anyone who might recognize her she had taken to performing her best 'Solid Snake' impression as she had ducked from car to car, lamp post to lamp post, and bush to bush. All she lacked was a cardboard box and a headband then the scene would have been perfect.

Rukia on the other hand had not been so bothered about the situation and had simply walked down the street like on any other day. Her only problem was keeping up with the frantically darting strawberry.

"Aren't you afraid of being seen?!" hissed Ichiko as she slumped down against the side of a large van to let Rukia catch up.

"Why should I be? I'm not the one who doesn't want people to see she's a girl. I've got nothing to hide." Rukia waved a dismissive hand and walked on past the red head.

"Nothing to hide, eh? How about the fact that this is a _school day_ and we could get ratted out and dragged into detention all week for being truant if we're seen?"

Rukia paused before she stepped out from behind the cover of the van and thought for a moment.

And so Solid Snake and Sam Fisher continued their stealthy advance with a renewed vigour.

----------------------------

Some time later Rukia and Ichiko arrived at the little back alley that led to the solitary store that was the Urahara Shop and took the time to stand up and get out of their crouching stances.

Ichiko flexed the last bit of stiffness out of her arms and added the stealth act to the list of reasons to string up Urahara by his genitals.

Marching towards the door with a stern look of anger the pair stopped dead as they noticed that the heavy metal shutter was still down over the door.

"What kind of craptastic business man isn't open by 9 o'clock?" Ichiko began to hammer at the metal and shouted through the small opening that had been cut in it for the mail to be posted through.

"Urahara! URAHARA! OPEN UP YOU OLD PERVERT! I'VE GOT A BONE TO PICK WITH YOU!" Rukia began to snigger but a venomous look from Ichiko shut her up immediately and she went about pretending to see if there was a way in round the sides.

"OPEN UP DAMMIT!" there was no reply and no sounds other than the echoing of the rattled metal and the silence only served to piss her off even more.

"Maybe he's not in," chipped in Rukia, "Maybe he went out shopping."

Ichiko growled like an angry dog and stepped back away from the door a few paces.

"The hell he did!" Ichiko began to stretch her legs like an athlete getting ready for an event. Rukia peered through the letter box trying to look for any movement but spotted nothing.

"Ok old man! You had your chance! If you won't let me in, I'm coming in for you!"

Rukia turned around a little confused and her eyes went wide in shock as she saw the furious red head charging straight towards her and the door. Giving a yell of surprise she barely managed to dive out of the way in time as Ichiko drop kicked the door.

----------------------_Meanwhile in the Urahara Shop_--------------------------

Kisuke lay peacefully beside the beautiful Yoruichi in a mess of tangled sheets and limbs as he dreamed of god knows what with a creepy smile on his lips. He slept like a baby after indulging in too much sake the night before and his gentle snoring was the only sound in the entire building…

…Apart from that very loud banging at the shutters.

Urahara mumbled and turned over in a subconscious attempt to drown out the sound with his pillow, and booted Yoruichi in the process, rousing her from her own rest.

Reflexively she bolted up right, one eye gummed shut and her hair looking like a poorly trimmed decorative hedge. She listened to the sound of rattling metal and prodded Urahara insistently.

"Kisuke! Kisuke! There's someone at the door!" he rolled onto his back and snored a little louder much to her annoyance, and so she got up, taking the sheets with her as she went into the kitchen and emerged a few moments later with a pan fun of cold water, and proceeded to dump it over him before dropping the pan itself on his head.

"T-THE CAKE IS A LIE!" he shouted suddenly as he leapt up at the touch of icy water and hard pan.

"What's going on?" he yawned as he rubbed his eyes and looked up at the sheet clad woman beside him.

"There's someone at the door, and they sound very determined to get in." Urahara considered asking her why she couldn't get the door, but seeing her pick up the pan again made him discard the question before it was asked, and instead got up and slid on a robe before going out to the shop floor.

"I'm sorry, sir or madam, but the opening ours are-" suddenly the banging stopped and Urahara stood still, listening intently, "Hmmm… maybe they left."

He strained his hearing as he was sure he heard a voice outside but couldn't make out what it said, so he moved closer until he heard a yell from outside and a sudden loud bang.

Urahara lay sprawled out on the floor completely dazed under the wreckage of the front door and watched the little birdies flying circles round his head as he mumbled in a concussed stupor.

"The opening hours are half past cake to- GAH!" Ichiko grabbed Urahara by the neck of his robe and hoisted him up from under the twisted remains of part of the metal shutter, which Ichiko stood upon, and glared at him with the fury of a sun going super nova.

"You're going to pay for what you did to me, Urahara!" Kisuke blinked away his dazed state and squinted at Ichiko for a long moment before finally daring to speak.

"Kurosaki-kun?" he looked down and noticed her barely concealed breasts and grinned broadly, "Oh, my apologise madam, I mistook you for someone much less gifted- OOF!" Ichiko choke slammed the startled businessman into the floor and began stamping on him furiously.

"YOU HAD IT RIGHT THE FIRST TIME, YOU DAMNED PERVERT! I'M GONNA KILL YOU FOR WHAT YOU DID TO ME!"

Rukia grabbed Ichiko and pulled her away from the twitching shop keeper as quickly as she could.

"Ichiko! Calm down! If you kill him he can't change you back! Just calm down and we can talk about this rationally!" after Ichiko had taken a moment to calm down Rukia let go of her.

"You're right I need to calm- HEY!" Ichiko shouted as Rukia ran forward and started laying the boot in for herself.

"DAMMIT! WHY DID YOU MAKE HIS BREASTS BIGGER, YOU FREAKY OLD PERVERT?! DID I NOT PAY YOU ENOUGH?! YOU'RE A DEAD MAN!"

Ichiko managed to wrestle her away with her legs still flailing.

"Take your own advice, dammit!"

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Nursing a multitude of new bruises, Urahara Kisuke sat at the table in the back of the shop with Rukia and Ichiko while Kisuke's assistants went about repairing the doorway. Kisuke couldn't help but stare at Ichiko, partly through curiosity, partly because of amusement, but mostly because that shirt was quite revealing. Urahara managed to look away from what a certain mod soul might call her 'Valley of the Gods' before Ichiko noticed, therefore avoiding another beating, but there was only so long he could sit there in peaceful silence staring at Ichiko's newly gained assets before the inevitable question was asked.

"So why the hell did you do this to me?" Ichiko leaned forward with her hands on the desk, and if it hadn't been for the poisonous glare she was throwing his way, Kisuke's eyes might once again have been tempted to venture south.

"Why Kurosaki-kun, what makes you think this was my doing?" Urahara answered with a large smile that was meant to be innocent, but looked more like a mischievous child. Ichiko bit back her rage and growled dangerous.

"Because, _old man_, you were the one who was messing around with my body while I was out of it, and I only felt funny after your fruity little session with me."

"Well…" he began hesitantly, "I _might_ have done something to your body while you were training with Renji… but I never planned on doing this!" he hastily finished his answer as he saw Ichiko balling up her fist.

"What exactly did you do?" Rukia asked as she forcibly made Ichiko retake her seat. It was going to be tough being the referee between these two she thought.

"I was trying to play pranks on Kurosaki-kun when she…er… he came here the other day, but he managed to avoid every single one of my deviously hidden traps," Ichiko scoffed at this, but Urahara continued, apparently unphased by the criticism, "I decided that I needed to try something out of the ordinary so I tried to make some special itching powder, but…" Kisuke suddenly trailed off, suddenly a little hesitant.

"But what?" Ichiko and Rukia said in tandem.

"I mixed up the powders in the test tube rack and apparently I used my gender shift powder on you by accident."

Rukia and Ichiko stared at Urahara in disbelief and shock as the store manager turned a shade of red that was unnatural for him.

"I don't know what's worse," Ichiko said eventually, "That you mixed up the powders, or that you purposely made something that would change a person's gender. You're even fruitier than I thought."

"I didn't make it on purpose!" Urahara kicked in quickly, "I made it accidentally while trying to make something that would be a sort of, instant, temporary disguise. The plan was to make it change you to look like someone else completely, body size, shape and looks, the lot. But it didn't work quite right."

"Well… that much is clear, but at least its only temporary." Rukia said a little too enthusiastically for Ichiko's liking.

"Not quite… that was the other problem." Urahara winced and braced himself for the inevitable outburst, "It's permanent."

Ichiko turned almost mechanically towards the shop keeper with fire raging in her eyes and tried to lunge at him over the table, but Rukia managed to hold her back.

"YOU MEAN I'M STUCK LIKE THIS FOREVER?!"

"There _is_ a cure," Kisuke added as he scooted further away from the girl whose face had become as red with rage as her hair.

"How did you find all this out anyway, who was stupid enough to let you try your crazy experiments on them?" Rukia said with a puzzled expression.

"Tessai volunteered." said Urahara. Both Rukia and Ichiko froze as the horrid image of Tessai as an over-muscled woman with a receding hair line and a moustache forever carved itself into their minds. They shuddered.

Ichiko looked up at Urahara who shuddered also. She suddenly felt sick and muttered, "You sick bastard…"

"There are some things that regrettably you can't _un-see_. Needless to say, after that little episode I rushed to find a cure, and that cure is an application of more powder."

"Well why didn't you say that earlier?! Go get some more!" Ichiko yelled impatiently as she thought that this ordeal couldn't be over with soon enough.

"I can't."

"Why not?"

"I… used the last of it on you."

Ichiko's eye twitched in annoyance.

"Well can't you make more?" she said with barely contained rage.

"Nope. After the original experiments," they all shuddered again and Rukia looked like she was resisting vomiting, "I burned the recipe."

"Why did you keep some of it then?"

"I must have forgotten, plus, there was some nights when Yoruichi and I like to get a little adventurous… y'know, role reversal-"

"Ok, stop RIGHT there! I don't want to hear about your private life." Ichiko was beginning to hate Urahara more and more each second, especially because it would take a lot of meditation to get rid of the thought of Yoruichi with something extra down under.

"Is there ANYTHING you can do?" Rukia asked while Ichiko tried to refrain from throwing up on the floor.

"If I can get even a tiny bit of the powder I can remake more."

"Where would there be any left?" Ichiko asked, looking a little worse for wear.

"Well, if you haven't showered yet, there could still be some on your skin. I'll have a look for you." Before Ichiko could stop him, Urahara was sat on the table and lifting up Ichiko's top with his hands getting a little too personal.

"H-HEY! Stop that! What do you think you're doing you pervert?!"

"What's going on in here?" the sound of another voice drew everyone's attention and they all stopped where they were as they noticed Yoruichi in her human form coming out of the back.

"What…the…hell…" Yoruichi stared in disbelief at the sight of Urahara with his hands thrust up the clearly reluctant Ichiko's top and the gradually fading smile on Kisuke's face, "…do you think you're DOING?!" before Kisuke could answer, yet another foot made contact with his face.

-----------------------------------------------------

"So… HE did this to you?" Yoruichi said turning to glare at Urahara who was sat in the corner like an admonished puppy as well as sporting a fresh bandage over the boot mark on his face.

"You're going to do everything in your power to rectify this mistake, _AREN'T you??_" Yoruichi's angry look made Urahara swallow nervously and nod, and Ichiko felt almost sorry for him.

Almost.

"Yes, ma'am…" he whimpered at the sight of her flexing her fists.

"And why the hell were you touching Ichiko up?" without warning Yoruichi, who had positioned herself next to Ichiko, grabbed Ichiko's head and shoved it into her cleavage, much to the surprise of everyone in the room.

"How could you try to take advantage of such a sweet young girl, especially when she's going through such a traumatic time?" Yoruichi sounded oddly mother like in the way she spoke as she cradled Ichiko to her bosom while stroking her hair, despite her attempts to get free.

"I was trying to see if there was any powder left that I could use to make more, but there wasn't."

Ichiko managed to eventually break free of Yoruichi's death grip and gulped in air as her face went back from a nasty shade of blue to being a blushing red.

"So how long am I going to be stuck like this?" she said after finally getting he breath back and remembering that she was angry at Urahara.

"It's hard to say, I'll have to start experimenting again." Everyone shuddered again at the image of the last lot of experiments, "Oh no no no… dear GOD no! Tessai won't be my test subject this time. I'll use someone a little more pleasing to the eye."

"Who are you going to rope into doing that job?" Rukia asked.

"Well, I just happen to have a volunteer!" Kisuke chirped as he stood up and slid back a door like a showman showing off a side show attraction. Behind the door lay the heavily bandaged form of Renji.

"I thought you said your test subject would be easier on the eyes?" Ichiko said with an evil grin as he tried not to laugh at the burnt and battered Shinigami, who's usually bright red hair had turned neon green thanks to the gunge that had fallen on him.

"HEY! You can shut up, Strawberry-… Ichigo? What the hell happened to you?" the pineapple like man stared at Ichiko with a look of total incomprehension.

"I could ask you the same thing." Ichiko chuckled as he pointed at the other's hair. Renji grumbled at the memory of his own clumsiness and cursed Urahara under his breath.

"Urahara got me with the pranks he set up for you…"

Ichiko burst out laughing, "You fell for THOSE obvious tricks? How dumb ARE you?" Renji growled and grinned evilly, ignoring the barb the best he could.

"So, I see you had that sex change you've been wanting for a while, I always thought you were a pussy."

Ichiko stomped over towards him and dug her heel into his ribs, drawing a loud scream from him.

"Brave words from someone whose bed ridden, plus, this 'pussy' is the closest you'll ever get to the real thing."

"Ladies, ladies! Let's calm down!" Urahara moved Ichiko away from the prone Renji who tried to object to being called a lady, but Urahara silenced him with a subtle kick to his already injured ribs.

"I'll get started on trying to fix the situation as quickly as I can, but it may take quite some time. My advice would be to try and get assistance from as many people as you can. Maybe you could try asking the 12th Division to see if they can come up with a solution. In the mean time you'll unfortunately have to make do with how you are."

Ichiko sighed in resignation and began to walk out of the store with Rukia, but Yoruichi stopped them and hugged Ichiko reassuringly quite to her surprise.

"Don't worry, it'll be ok, it'll take some getting used to but you'll find its pretty easy being a girl… ok that's a lie, but try to enjoy it while you can, not many boys get to see what its like on this side of the fence, so to speak. Oh, and it would be worth your while to get some er… better fitting clothes, that shirt doesn't do you justice."

Ichiko blushed bright red and she looked away with an expression of annoyance to hide her embarrassment.

"Gee... Thanks…"

Urahara and Yoruichi watched from the door as the pair left and waved them good bye as Rukia led the crest fallen Ichigo away.

"Goodbye!" called Urahara, "You should probably come back soon! I need to see the extent of the changes, so I'll need to give you a full body physical!"

Ichiko turned back angrily to spit out an angry remark, but as she did she noticed him curled in a ball on the floor as Yoruichi beat him furiously with a sandal.

"Good enough…" Ichiko muttered, "So… what now?"

Rukia got a sudden bright look in her eyes when he asked, and in turn Ichiko got a very bad feeling and regretted asking.

"Well, as Yoruichi-san said, you should get some clothes, so that means…"

"Oh god…"

"We get to go shopping! I can't wait to see what you look like in a dress!"

"You're enjoying seeing me tortured like this, aren't you?" Ichiko said grimly.

"Of course! It's so fun watching to squirm. Plus, if we're going into clothes shops, I might as well get some outfits for myself."

"Let me guess… I'm paying…?" Rukia nodded and Ichiko was sure she could hear her wallet crying in her back pocket.

"I just hope we don't run into anyone else we know-" Ichiko stopped suddenly, but her heart began to thump heavily. It was too late, she'd said what she knew she shouldn't have, and the realisation hit her and she could almost feel the jinx happening. Why was her luck so bad?

Rukia turned around as the sound of charging feet started to get louder and louder, and a large dust cloud started to float up above the buildings down the street and eventually turned the corner.

"What the hell...?" Both of them suddenly noticed who was causing such a mess, and they recognized them immediately.

"Rangiku-san?" Rukia exclaimed in confusion as the buxom Shinigami skidded to a halt in front of them, and caught her breath.

"Did someone mention shopping?!"


	4. Chapter 4: Touchie Feely, Panties Stealy

**Author's Notes: **Sorry about this one being late, had a bit of trouble with motivation and ideas, but it's up now and I hope you enjoy!

I'm running low on ideas, so if anyone wants to pitch in any ideas for future chapters, feel free to send me a PM, if I like em and think they're viable for where I wanna take the story I'll use em' and I'll be sure to give you credit where credit is due!

Thanks again to Dr VonDoomsatan for beta reading and helping me make a rough gem shine.

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Ichiko and Rukia simultaneously turned and looked at each other as they both thought the same silent question.

'How the hell did she hear us?'

Once Rangiku had caught her breath she stood up straight a little too quickly, almost making her boobs bounce out of the tight fitting school shirt. An action which caught Ichiko's attention and made her reluctantly blush. _At least I know I'm still a guy at heart._ She thought.

"So, Kuchiki-san, Kurosaki-kun. Are we gonna get going or…" Rangiku trailed off as she suddenly noticed the two people in front of her. One was definitely Rukia, but who was the other? She could have sworn that from a distance she had seen Kurosaki Ichigo, but now that she looked closer there were a couple of somewhat important differences.

"Oh… I'm sorry, I don't think we've met, I thought you looked like someone I know but I must've been mistaken." Ichiko did a small cheer inside her mind, this was great! If someone who'd seen her so many times as a guy didn't immediately recognize her then there was a chance this wouldn't be as painful as she thought it would… although Matsumoto wasn't exactly the sharpest knife in the box, but it was a start.

"So…" Matsumoto non-so-subtly shifted over to Rukia's side and whispered loudly in her ear, "Who's the girl? She's kinda cute."

Ichiko wanted as few people knowing about her little 'incident' as possible, and coupled with the prospect of having to suffer the embarrassment of buying female clothes, Matsumoto Rangiku ranked pretty high up on the list of people she'd rather not have around right now. _This is the perfect opportunity to ditch her. _Ichiko thought, _I have to act quickly._

Ichiko cringed inside as she forced herself to bring back out the unpractised girly voice she'd hoped to not have to use, but unfortunately she needed to use everything she could to sound convincing.

"Hi, I'm Rukia's friend from school, Ichiko, we were just about to go-"

"This is Ichigo," Rukia butted in, "Urahara-san accidentally turned him into a girl."

Ichiko's jaw fell open in disbelief as she froze in the slightly feminine pose she'd tried to execute, making her look like some kind of shocked shop mannequin.

"Y-you traitor!" Ichiko yelled as Rukia smiled at her comedy discomfort. Ichiko made to grab Rukia by the neck, but she paused half way as the sound of a high pitched squeal caught both their attention.

"Kawaaaaiiiii!" Matsumoto unceremoniously grabbed Ichiko and hugged her to her ample breasts, making Ichiko wonder what fascination women had with shoving her head into their breasts now that she was a woman too, but such a trivial thought fled her mind as her need for air took priority, and she struggled to free herself from the suffocating warmth of Rangiku's 'Valley of the Gods'.

"To think I almost didn't recognize you!" Matsumoto said in a voice that was half restrained laughter, and half the tone women tend to descend into using when confronted with a cute baby.

"You look so cute as a girl!" She nuzzled against Ichiko's hair despite the strawberry's protests and grabbed her breasts when she peered over her shoulder and looked down the tight shirt, "Ooooo! Looks like Urahara-san really knows how to make a woman!"

Ichiko couldn't hold her anger in any more and with a struggling flail she managed to break free of Matsumoto's perverted grip and spin around to look at her with a face as red as her ruffled hair.

"Enough of this shit! Why the hell does everyone keep molesting me?! And you should know better! I'm underage dammit!" Rangiku could barely contain her laughter as Ichiko ranted at her until she was out of breath, but she thought that laughing would only make it worse and tried in her own way to calm down the situation.

"You're a little tense, maybe you should… relieve the stress." The buxom red-head emphasised her words with a wink making Ichiko stop dead with a confused look on her face.

"How would I…" comprehension suddenly hit Ichiko, "Dammit! Stop being perverted! I'm not gonna do anything you're thinking of!"

"You mean you've been a girl for how long and you've not…" she trailed off and made an obscene gesture with her fingers.

Ichiko looked like she was about to explode from embarrassment.

"Hell no! I'm not gonna do that!" there wasn't a name for the shade of red that Ichiko had turned.

"Wow… you really are uptight!" Rangiku pouted as Rukia made no attempt to hide her snickering.

"Matsumoto!" called an angry voice from back down the street, cutting off any retort the flustered Ichiko had it store.

"Why did you run off like that?! You know I can't run that fast in this clumsy gigai!"

All three of them turned to see a white haired boy running down the street as fast as he could towards them. Upon seeing his stern expression Ichiko instantly knew it was Hitsugaya Toshiro, although the stark white hair was a blatant give away.

"Captain Hitsugaya!" Matsumoto called in a sing-song tone as she waved to the charging white haired lad.

"Why the hell did you run out in the middle of a video-link meeting with Captain-Commander Yamamoto?"

Rangiku smiled and gestured dismissively.

"Oh, that, well, I was bored and I heard Ichigo-… oops, Ichiko-san and Rukia-san mention shopping, so I just HAD to come!" Hitsugaya was about to chide her when her words finally sunk in and he blinked at the two girls in front of him. One was definitely Kuchiki Rukia, but who did Rangiku say the other one was?

"Ichiko…?" he said with more than a little tone of confusion.

"Oh yes! This is Ichiko, that's Ichigo's name now that he's turned into a girl." Ichiko bit back her embarrassment and anger and threw Matsumoto a venomous look.

"Do you have to tell EVERYONE? Can't you PLEASE keep this quiet? Its embarrassing enough as it is!"

"You're embarrassed? I thought you would have wanted to flaunt your new… assets, Ichiko-chan! Plus, there's no harm in telling the Captain, he's not the kind to go blabbing it, right, Captain Hitsugaya?"

All three women turned to Toshiro and all of them looked equally puzzled as the young Captain's face quivered as if he was about to either cry or vomit.

"Captain… are you ok?"

All of a sudden Hitsugaya broke and burst into uncharacteristic hysterical laughter. The sight of Toshiro with tears of amusement flowing down his cheeks as he pointed at Ichiko was something none of those present thought they would ever witness, but for Ichiko one emotion broke through the surprised stupor.

Unbridled rage.

"DAMNIT YOU LITTLE ALBINO BRAT! I'M GONNA KILL YOU FOR THINKING THIS IS FUNNY!!!" Ichiko balled her fists and charged at Hitsugaya who was starting to sway unsteadily from all the laughing, and Rukia tried to step in front of the charging redhead, but she didn't react quick enough, and instead of blocking her path, Rukia's foot caught Ichiko's, sending her flying forwards, and much to the raging strawberry's dismay, she landed on top of Hitsugaya.

Toshiro's laughter was suddenly drowned out by the presence of cleavage over his face.

They both froze in shock for a few moments until Toshiro's need to breath kicked in and he pushed the stunned and heavily blushing Ichiko up away from him and gulped in a much needed lungful of air.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?!" yelled Ichiko as both of them looked at the hasty positioning of Hitsugaya's hands, and realised he'd grabbed more than a handful of Ichiko's new found womanhood in order to hoist her up.

Both of them scrambled hastily away from each other, with Ichiko retreating behind Rukia with her arms wrapped protectively over her chest while Hitsugaya shivered and stared at his hands in horror.

"What's the matter, Captain?" Asked Matsumoto as she leant over his shoulder to look at his hands as well.

"I-I touched her breast… I feel dirty!"

"What's wrong with that? The Captain has touched _mine_ by accident before now."

"Yeah, but you're not really a guy!"

-------------------------------------------------------

After Hitsugaya had finally calmed down and had washed his hands at least fifteen times at the nearest public toilets, they all decided that despite the drama of the morning so far, and Ichiko's reluctance, she REALLY needed some girl's clothes.

Rukia and Matsumoto had argued as they walked, each one professing that they should go to a different mall while Hitsugaya and Ichiko hung back with the look of complete bafflement that only men can manage when confronted with matters of shopping.

Eventually they decided to go with Rukia's suggestion as it was decided that Matsumoto's favourite clothes stores might sell things that were a bit too racy for Ichiko's liking, and so they went off to put Ichiko through a feminine baptism of fire.

"So what do we need then?" Ichiko asked, hoping to make a decisive list so they could cut out any unnecessary wondering around and rash throwing around of money.

"Hmm… well, first of all, you REALLY need a new top, that one is… well… revealing." Rukia said, making Ichiko cross her arms over her chest again. She could have sworn she heard Rukia mutter jealously at the thought of Ichiko's chest, but she chose to ignore it.

"Then we should get you some pants and skirts, oh! And also a dress for formal occasions!"

"No dresses…" Ichiko muttered sternly.

"Oh come on, Ichiko-chan!" butted in Matsumoto as she pinched Ichiko's cheeks like she would a child's, "You'll look so cute in a dress! And if we find a really nice one, we can test out the nose-bleed factor on Captain Hitsugaya!"

The white haired Captain turned a bright shade of pink and looked away from Ichiko. He'd been avoiding her eyes ever since the little incident before.

"No… dresses…!" Ichiko growled. She'd sooner die than dress up in a frilly bit of material. She wanted to remain as manly as possible.

"If you don't let us get you a dress, we'll force you to get a maid's costume." Rukia said with a devious smile.

"You wouldn't dare!" Ichiko rounded on her with an evil glare, but the sound of Matsumoto cracking her knuckles and chuckling mischievously made her feel more than a little threatened.

'_Crap… they could easily overpower me…'_

"Fine! I'll get a dress, but nothing too frilly!"

"Deal!" Rukia smiled victoriously, and as they continued walking Matsumoto pulled level with Rukia and whispered.

"Do you think we could get a maid costume for her anyway?"

"I HEARD THAT!"

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As Ichiko had suspected, Rukia and Matsumoto had pulled Toshiro and her around every shop they liked the look of, and had taken an age to look at everything, most of which was for them and not Ichiko, but amongst the boredom and continuous molestation that was part of being their dress dummy, there had been one small mercy when Rukia had approached her wielding a new dress and a large grin.

"That looks too small for me…" Ichiko said after inspecting the not-so-bad garment.

"I know." The gears turned for a moment in Ichiko's head before she realised what she meant and sighed.

"How much…?" Ichiko was about to reach for her wallet when Toshiro stopped her and pulled out his own.

"Rukia's the responsibility of Soul Society; I've been given funds for this kind of situation, so you don't have to pay for her." Ichiko couldn't help but smile, and turned to Hitsugaya as a plan formed in her mind.

"You on the other hand…" Toshiro interjected before Ichiko could speak, "Are NOT the responsibility of Soul Society. So pay for yourself." Ichiko's grin disappeared instantly and was replaced with a dejected look of failure.

"Damn…"

----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some hours later, Ichiko was forcibly laden with bags of clothing, mostly her own, and thanks to Rukia and Matsumoto, and even Hitsugaya at a few points, she had acquired what Ichiko was loath to admit was a quite nice new wardrobe selection. But she'd never admit it to them.

"Ok… so that's the school uniform taken care of now as well. So that means there's just one more thing on the list." Matsumoto ticked off another item on the scrap of paper she was carrying then put it back into one of her bags, all of which she'd piled onto the unlucky Captain who was acting pack mule for the group. He didn't seem to be complaining though, although if he did the sound would have been drowned out by all the bags.

"MORE stuff?!" Ichiko sighed as she noticed her arms were starting to hurt like hell from all the weight.

"Well we've missed the most important part so far!" Matsumoto pouted as if it should be obvious what they'd missed, but Ichiko stared at her blankly.

"Underwear, you idiot!" kicked in Rukia as she yanked on the top of Ichiko's baggy boxers that stuck out from the top of her tightly belted pants.

"You can't go round in your old ones forever, you'll look sloppy."

"Well I hope it's not far…" Ichiko grumbled while trying to maintain her balance from Rukia's emphasising assault on her underwear.

"Don't worry!" Rangiku chirped cheerfully in a sing-song tone, "I know just the place!" she stepped aside and pointed to the store behind her a little way in the distance, and Rukia smiled and gave a thumbs up.

"Perfect! Just the place to go to get you REALLY feeling like a girl!"

Hitsugaya and Ichiko froze in slack jawed shock and dropped their bags as they looked at the store the other two were discussing.

"Ann… Summers?" **(Author's Note: Don't know about Ann Summers? Look it up.)**

"THE HELL WE'RE GOING IN THERE!" Toshiro and Ichiko shouted in tandem.

"Oh come on, Kurosaki-chan! What you really need is some lingerie! Some nice sexy undies to get the boy's motors running!" she winked playfully and Ichiko turned bright red along with Toshiro.

"I don't want to get boy's motors running!"

"Oh right, I forgot you didn't lean that way. You'll need sexy undies to get the girl's motors running then."

"I WON'T BE GETTING ANY MOTORS RUNNING DAMMIT!" she yelled.

"Too right you won't if you're dressed like that!"

Ichiko would have retorted but her embarrassment and her reluctance to dig herself into an even deeper hole of innuendo made her tongue tied, but luck was kind of on her side as all conversation was cut off by the simultaneous beeping of Rangiku, Rukia and Toshiro's cell phones.

"A Hollow!" Rukia blurted unnecessarily as she began to look around for where the dot on her screen was indicating.

"Over there." Said Toshiro calmly as he pointed to a slowly opening gargant in the sky near the lingerie store.

As the boundaries of reality pushed back a masked head emerged and looked around before jumping to the ground.

"What… the hell?" Ichiko muttered as she looked closer at the odd Hollow. The creature was hunched over and appeared to have a large sack on its back that looked close to bursting point, and on its head it wore a large handkerchief that was tied under its nose like a cheesy Japanese mugger.

"Panties!" the creature called out as it noticed the lingerie shop and the women inside.

"…don't tell me… a panty thief hollow…?"

"I've seen weirder…" Toshiro said with an equally baffled expression, "But this is pretty high on the list."

The three full-time Shinigami popped their soul candies and left their bodies in the care of their mod souls, while Ichiko fumbled with her Shinigami badge.

"Here, let me help you." Said the shy mod soul that was inside of Toshiro's body.

"Thanks." Ichiko touched the signet to her chest and popped forwards while her body dropped into the waiting arms of the white haired youth.

"Take care of my body ok? Oh…" Ichiko leaned in close and balled her fist as she whispered dangerously, "If you try anything… I'll kill you."

"I-I wouldn't do anything like that!" said the innocent little boy with a bright red face.

"Kurosaki! Come on!" called the real Toshiro, snapping Ichiko back to her senses.

"Right… OH FOR THE LOVE OF-"

"What is it?" said Rukia as she turned back, and as she saw Ichiko her eyes went wide in astonishment.

"My soul is a girl too!!! That's it… Urahara is going to suffer before I kill him…"

"I think that's the least of your worries…" said Rukia with that recently familiar tone of jealousy as she pointed at Ichiko's chest.

Ichiko looked down and froze with a squeak.

"W-why the hell is this so low cut?!" Unlike almost every other female Shinigami she'd seen, her kimono was more accustomed to Matsumoto's in that is was open by quite a bit at the chest and accentuated Ichiko's bosom more than she would have liked. More then she would have liked being any accentuation at all.

"If this is a result of the powder-"

"Kurosaki! There are more pressing matters than your cleavage!" shouted Toshiro as the others chased after the quickly darting Hollow.

Ichiko grumbled as she ran after it as well, all the time she tried to pull the material of her top closer together to no avail. She hoped it wouldn't slip further apart while running or things could get _really_ embarrassing.

She'd been paying so much attention to her clothing that she didn't notice the giant monstrosity land in front of her until she ran straight into its leg and stumbled back from the impact.

"Huh?" both she and the Hollow said in unison as they looked at each other.

"Er…"

"PANTIES!" the Hollow bellowed as it suddenly lunged for the unprepared Ichiko, who barely had time to dodge the strike.

"Whoa!" Ichiko skidded to a halt a few meters away and reached behind her head and pulled out Zangetsu, uncoiling the bandages from around it with a flutter,

"So you wanna play rough, huh?" Ichiko got into her usual battle ready stance with her zanpakuto held out in front of her in a double handed grip, but as the hollow charged again and she raised her blade to block, she barely managed to deflect the blow as her stance squashed her breasts between her arms, making it hard to move freely.

"Dammit! Is this day going to get any worse?!"

…_Shit…Just had to jinx it didn't I?_

"Wots dis…?!" said in the hollow in a peculiar accent, "Dis one smells unspoilt and frrrrrresh! I bet you have mmmmmmm delicious panties!"

Ichiko froze in shocked disgust and shivered at the hollows repulsive comments.

"What the hell kind of freak are you?! And why do you remind me of Keigo so much?!" Ichiko danced backwards as the creature came at her with grabbing and pummelling hands, and she deflected each with a one handed strike, twisting her body a little unnaturally to avoid obstructing her arms with her boobs. The change was slight, but it was enough to rob all her blows of much of their force, and each block threw her a little more off balance.

"GIVE ME YOURRRR PANTIES!"

"That's what I was here to buy, you pervert! Now get the hell away from me!"

The hollow tried to crush Ichiko with a straight down punch but she blocked the strike easily, but the hollow attacked again this time with a long, slimy tongue that whipped round and slammed into Ichiko's undefended flank, sending her flying.

Before Ichiko could rise the hollow stood over her and held her down, its tongue began to slither obscenely in the air above her and she couldn't help but feel terrified.

"I can tell that you will be soooooo sweeeeeeeet!" gurgled the hollow as it chuckled and moved in with its tongue. Ichiko closed her eyes tight as she continued to struggle.

_Oh God! I did not want anything like this to happen! Especially on my first day as a girl!_

Suddenly there was a high pitched howl and Ichiko opened her eyes to see the hollow rear up with half its tongue missing. She gave a little cheer of relief but suddenly screamed as the stump of its tongue sprayed out a thick green goo, and still being held down she couldn't avoid it as it splattered all over her.

The hand lifted off her after a moment and Ichiko bolted upright and began to try and get rid of the foul smelling gloop that covered her, while resisting the temptation to throw up.

"This… is… so disgusting…" she whimpered while trying to hock up the green stuff that had gotten into her mouth when she'd been screaming.

"PATOOI!"

"You shouldn't do that; it's very unlady-like."

Ichiko turned sharply and glared venomously at Rukia who was trying hard not to laugh.

"Where the hell were you?!"

"I was hanging back, Captain Hitsugaya said we should let you fight it and see if the change has affected your combat ability."

Ichiko gritted her teeth and balled her fist.

"Oh he did, did he?"

"But don't worry; he took care of it when he saw you were in trouble."

"He took his damned time!" she hissed.

"I could have left you alone with the hollow, y'know. He looked like he wanted to have some fun with you; it looked like something out of a hentai. You should be grateful that I saved you." Ichiko could have sworn she saw Hitsugaya grin, but she could have been mistaken.

"Grateful?! Isn't killing hollows your job anyway- hang on… how do you know it looks like something from a hentai?" Toshiro turned bright red and struggled to form a reply as Ichiko began to grin evilly.

"Well well well, _Honourable Captain Hitsugaya_… looks like the hollow wasn't the only pervert in the fight just now."

Matsumoto let out a complaining whine and crossed her arms under her bosom with a huff.

"The Captain prefers cartoon boobs to mine?! I'm starting to worry about you."

"S-SHUT UP!"

------------------------------------------------------------

Ichiko and Rukia placed their bags down in front of the house and rested for a moment as they waited for someone to answer the ring of the doorbell.

"Why can't I just use my key?" Ichiko complained as she stretched her back and instinctively wiped her face. Despite being back in her body, she still felt as though she was covered in the creature's goo.

"You're only meant to have arrived today, 'Ichiko'; if you open the door with Ichigo's key it'll look a bit suspicious. Remember to act like a girl too."

Ichiko shivered at the thought of having to temporarily sacrifice her manliness to keep up the act in front of her dad, but she knew it was necessary.

Yuzu answered the door and welcomed them both warmly. Ichiko handed her a stuffed toy she'd picked up while shopping after taking Rukia's advice and buying a gift for each of her family to say 'thank you for letting me stay'. Together Rukia and Ichiko made their way up stairs, struggling to get the large bags up the narrow staircase.

"Finally! It's good to be home so I can relax. I've still got to decide where to put all…this…stuff… what the hell?" Ichiko trailed off as she stood in the doorway of her room and blinked in confusion as she saw her dad finishing moving stuff around.

"Oh! Welcome back, girls! Seeing as though Ichigo's not here, I thought I'd spread out the sleep arrangements a bit, you two will be sharing my son's room, after all, its not like either of you have got anything you've never seen before!" he laughed heartily as Ichiko felt a sweat drop roll down her temple in a mix of embarrassment and frustration.

"I've got plenty I've never seen before…" she muttered.

"Huh?"

"Oh, nothing, nothing! Thank you again for letting me stay, Isshin-oji-san."

"No need to be so formal! You can just call me, 'Super Amazing 'Steel Abs' Uncle Isshin'!" Ichiko and Rukia both stared in embarrassment as Isshin once against ripped open his shirt, as he often did, and posed like someone out of a cheap re-run of power rangers.

"Er… I'll stick with Uncle Isshin."

"Suit yourself! I'll let you girls get settled in, Yuzu will call you when dinners ready. Oh! Before I forget, Ichiko, I called up the school and got you enrolled, no need to let your education suffer while you're here!"

Rukia and Ichiko watched Isshin glide past them, posing as he went, before tripping and falling down the stairs in a spectacular mess.

"See, I told you he'd make you go to school."

They both went about trying to sort out where to put their new clothes, and ended up arguing over who got the underwear drawer, which they finally agreed to share. Ichiko had finally managed to get underwear, although that had been a battle in itself as Matsumoto had insisted on grabbing Ichiko's boobs and molesting them until she'd guessed the size, and much to her dismay she'd gotten it right, which had led to her bragging all the way back. Rukia had managed to avoid Matsumoto experimenting on her.

"You looked like you were having difficulty adapting your fighting style." Rukia said when they'd both finished their unpacking and lay on their respective beds.

"Yeah… I never thought having breasts would be so troublesome. They got in the way so much that I bit the bullet and asked Matsumoto to give me lessons on how to fight without them obstructing me." Rukia bolted up right with a pissed expression and glared at Ichigo.

"Why did you go to her about that?! How the hell is she more approachable than I am?!" Ichiko sat up and grinned mischievously.

"Lets face it, if I asked for _your_ advice on fighting with boobs in the way, it'd be like the blind leading the blind, understand, 'Twinkle-tits'? Good." She patted Rukia on the hell condescendingly, which was the straw that broke the camels back. Rukia lashed out with a punch.

"Niiiii-saaaan! You're baaaaaaaaaaaaack!" at the sound of all the commotion, Kon had forced open the drawer he'd been stuffed into and leapt out unwittingly, and got in the way of the punch, cushioning the blow as Rukia hit Ichiko.

The mod soul bounced off of Ichiko's face when she landed backwards against her bed, and landed in her cleavage, much to the mod soul's delight.

"Aaaaah! Another Valley of the Gods! What untold beauty possesses such wonderful love pillows??" Kon looked up and paused as he stared into oddly familiar eyes that were part of an oddly familiar orange head.

"Um… do I know you?"


	5. Chapter 5: Threes a CrowdNew Arm Lost

**Author's Notes:** I struggled with this chapter quite a bit. Too many games to play and when I FINALLY got down to writing it I struggled to stop it from becoming pure, unadulterated pornography, which I'll probably save for something on adultfanfiction.

------------------------

Kon yelled in surprise as he was launched across the room and impacted against the wall, but no sooner had he hit the floor than he was crushed under foot.

"Dammit you plushie-pervert! I'm not in the mood for your shit!" Ichiko ground her heel into the stuffed lion's head, drawing muffled cries of pain and surprise from the tortured Kon.

"You chose the wrong time to show your face. After the day I've had, I could sure use a punch bag!" Ichiko's face twisted into a sadistic smile as she lifted her foot and picked up the mangled toy by the ear.

"W-w-what the hell was that for?!" he shouted when Ichiko picked him up, "I compliment you and you go and attack me?? Unacceptable! I demand compensation! Twenty minutes in your love pillows should do!"

"What kind of compliment is shoving your face in my breasts? I should tear out your stuffing and use it to pad Rukia's bra!"

"Hey-" Rukia tried to interject but she was cut short as Kon was karate chopped towards her.

"Nee-san! Defend me!" Kon tried to jump at Rukia's chest but got punched to the floor for his troubles.

"Jeez! Even when you're being beaten up your minds _still_ filled with perverted thoughts."

"So domineering…" Kon croaked as he twitched on the floor, "That's what I love about you, Nee-san!"

"That's it; I'll hold him and you punch." Rukia grabbed Kon by the arms and hoisted him up while Ichiko cracked her knuckles.

"Gah! You two are almost as cruel as that bastard Ichigo!"

"Almost? Maybe I've slipped a little from being unconscious for two days." Ichiko grinned maliciously, making the cowardly lion shiver in fear but the feeling soon disappeared as he stared harder at the woman in front of him.

"What a minute… who ARE you?" Ichiko was kind of surprised that he hadn't figured it out yet, although part of her thought _'Well, he's not exactly the brightest candle…'_

Kon thought it over for a minute or two as he looked the girl over repeatedly. _Red hair… Well there's no way it could be Orihime with hair that short. Maybe Tatsuki? No… not with boobs like that. _Kon was about to give up trying to figure it out when he noticed something on the girl's belt and if he'd had blood, his face would have drained of it.

_'A Shinigami Substitute Seal…? It can't be.'_ The shaking mod soul looked up just as Ichiko got ready to throw a punch.

"I…Ichi…go?" _Please don't let it be true, please don't let it be true, please don't let it be true…_

"Got it in one!" Kon felt dirty to the very centre of his pill when the realisation that he'd been molesting a guy's boobs suddenly hit him, as did a fist.

Kon eventually picked himself up off the floor after a short period of whimpering and twitching, and stared at Ichiko with a mix of anger and confusion.

"Why…how…when…?" Ichiko sighed and sat back down on her bed. She was far too tired to explain her predicament again, especially to _him_, so she decided to give him enough to shut up.

"Urahara did it. He used the wrong powder."

"So you didn't have an operation, its all natural?" Ichiko bolted upright at the mention of a sex change operation and growled dangerously.

"Of course I didn't have an operation! And yes, _unfortunately_ its all natural…well as natural as you can get when it comes to Urahara…"

_'Hmmm… so technically I DIDN'T touch a guy's boob. Well… his new body is quite nice, and those boobs sure are nice, and eventually… hehehe.'_

"Ichigo-" began Kon as he crosses his arms and took on the expression of an annoyed parent.

"It's 'Ichiko' now." Interjected Rukia, drawing a shiver from Ichiko as if each mention of the girls name killed a little more of her manhood.

"Fine, Ichiko, you clearly can't take care of your own body, I mean look at you, you let an old pervert do weird things to you and turn you into a… luscious… woman. So, in order to protect you from yourself I'm taking your body until you can learn to respect it!"

Kon jumped across to Ichiko's bed and looked towards the window with an extremely fake look of surprise, "Is that a hollow I sense?" his acting ability left much to be desired, "I guess you should go fight it, don't worry though, _I'll_ take care of your body!"

"The hell you're getting into my body!"

"Maybe you should let him, Ichiko, so he can see how _he_ likes having his breasts randomly groped by people!" Rukia grinned evilly down at Kon, but Kon looked even happier at the though, much to her dismay.

"What a great idea! I'll get in your body and Nee-san can touch me where ever she wants…" Ichiko's eye twitched in anger as the plushie drooled at the thought.

"You weren't meant to take it that way!"

"Oh that its, you bean-bag-bastard! Your perverted ass is going down!"

"Hey! There's no need to get all uptight about it, I was just joking-"

"Rukia! Window!" Kon blinked in confusion as Rukia leapt across Ichiko's bed and opened the window while Ichiko herself got into a fighting stance.

"Eh? What are you doing- GAH!" Rukia ducked quickly as Ichiko hammered her foot into the stuffed toy, bouncing him off of the far wall, then as he flew back towards the enraged strawberry, Ichiko dropped down and bicycle kicked the stuffed mod-soul out of the open window and into the cool night air.

"AIIIIEEEEEE!" Kon screamed as he hit the street hard and lay twitching in pain. Ichiko leaned out of the window and shouted at the abused plushie.

"Don't you even think about sneaking back in tonight, you filthy-minded shit!"

Two passers by looked up at her in confusion and suddenly she turned bright red.

One of the pair who had long, shaggy black hair looked up at Ichiko and called out in a dull tone.

"Are you talking to us, woman?"

"Oh, er… sorry! I didn't mean you guys." The other of the pair let out a loud irritable huff and pulled his large hood further down over his face before the two continued to walk on.

"Phew!" Ichiko breathed a sigh of relief and closed the window, "Those guys looked rough. They'd probably have tried to come after me if I was still a guy."

--------------------------------------

Kon got unsteadily to his feet and tried to keep his balance while his head still swam.

"Damn that Ichig-… Ichiko, becoming a woman has made her even more violent! At least I'm safe now- OOF!"

Suddenly one of the two strangers stamped down on him uncaringly, crushing him down into the dirt once again.

"This town sure has some freaky-ass people… what the hell did that girl mean by shouting weird shit at us? We should have killed her." Grumbled the hooded figure as his partner stood on a tattered teddy that emitted an odd squeak.

"With these bodies I doubt we could kill anyone, plus, we're not allowed to even try. Aizen-sama's orders."

"Tch! Aizen … that bastard always spoils my fun!" the hooded man kicked out in irritation, and sent the stuffed toy flying as he passed it. _Odd…_ he thought, _I could've sworn I heard a scream…_

"Watch your mouth, Grimmjow, it was this kind of insubordination that got you sent on this mission as a punishment in the first place." Grimmjow pushed back his hood and scratched at his cheek where his mask would usually be. He hated wearing a gigai. It felt so filthy and weak.

"Yeah, well… I was bored and wanted to hunt."

Ulquiorra suddenly stopped and turned to look at Grimmjow.

"You lost four Arrancar on that expedition of yours. Are you sure you were the hunter in that matter and not the hunted?"

"Tch! I won _my_ fight, that's all that matters, if those pussies were too weak to win their own that's their problem." Grimmjow paused and looked at Ulquiorra who had set off again, and suddenly realised something.

"Wait a minute… why are _you_ on this mission?" the porcelain white Espada faltered in his step and Grimmjow trotted to his side with a wide grin as he realised he'd hit a nerve.

"Something tells me you're not here to babysit me, so what did you do, Golden Boy?"

Ulquiorra showed no more emotion on his face than he ever did, but he didn't meet Grimmjow's eye as he muttered lowly.

"I kept leaving the toilet seat up in the unisex bathroom…"

"WHAT?! That's it?!" Grimmjow stared at him in astonishment for a few moments then frowned, "Man… Aizen's _really_ getting petty… So, where do we go first?"

"We need to find somewhere to stay."

"You best not leave the toilet seat up in our new pad, or else Aizen might take one of _your_ arms too!" Grimmjow's sarcastic grin spread further as he began to flex his left arm, "Speaking of which, it's good to have my arm back, even if it is a weak one like this." Ulquiorra felt his infinite patience begin to finally reach an end as Grimmjow began to punch the air in front of him, and made loud exertion sounds right next to his ear.

Being stuck with him truly was a punishment.

"Are you going to shut up?" Ulquiorra said tersely.

"Make me!" Grimmjow laughed as he began to dance around his superior, throwing feign punches and kicks that stopped short of their targets as Ulquiorra stood statue still and watched his dancing blue haired underling, "In these bodies we're on level ground, our power as Arrancar has no effect on their fighting abilities. So why not give me a try?" he laughed again as he saw that Ulquiorra didn't dare take the bait, or at least that's what he thought until Ulquiorra suddenly lashed out with his right hand and caught him by the left wrist, and then pulling him close he grabbed his arm and slammed it down on his knee with a sickening crack.

"Hmmm… looks like having your arm back isn't all its cracked up to be."

Grimmjow stared in wide mouthed shock at his oddly angled arm, which hung limply mid-forearm.

"You… you…" Grimmjow stammered as he looked from the arm to Ulquiorra, to his arm, and back again. Grimmjow's face was the perfect example of utter astonishment as he finally finished his sentence, "You… MADE A JOKE?!"

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"Ichiko…" a voice whispered softly in her ear.

"Wake up, Ichiko…" Ichiko grumbled and turned over.

"It's… it's not time for school…" she managed through the sleepy haze.

"Get up now, Ichiko!" the voice grew louder and she felt a hand shaking her shoulder, followed by a wet splodge on her cheek.

Ichiko bolted upright and growled, slapping the hand from her shoulder as she tried to clear her mind.

"Dammit Rukia! Don't drip cold water on me if you want me to get up!"

"Rukia? Who the hell is that?" Ichiko forced her eyes open as she suddenly recognized the distorted voice, and gasped as she looked up at a figure all in white.

"Y-you!" she stammered as she scrambled to her feet. She looked around quickly and saw that she was in the world inside her mind and cold rain hammered down around her, "You're my inner hollow!"

"I have a question for you, Ichiko, and I want a quick answer." Ichiko suddenly realised that a white Zangetsu was pointed at her throat, and she wouldn't be able to draw her own in time if the hollow struck.

"What question?"

"What in the name of Hueco Mundo… **DID YOU DO TO ME**?!" Ichiko looked down at the sodden robes of the monochrome version of herself, and saw that even her hollow hadn't escaped the effects of Urahara's powder.

"You were affected too?!" she said in genuine surprise as a deep blush rose in her cheeks at the sight of the soaked white robes of 'Hichiko' clinging to her body. "DAMN RIGHT I WAS AFFECTED!" The white Zangetsu at Ichiko's throat trembled dangerously as Hichiko evidently fought back her rage at being turned into a woman, "WHY DO I HAVE BREASTS?!"

"Can I ask something?" Ichiko slowly moved back, subtly gaining a bit of distance from the shaking blade.

"What is it?!"

"Do you think wearing white in a rain storm was a good idea?" Hichiko raised an eyebrow in confusion and looked down as Ichiko motioned at the hollow's chest.

"GAH!" Hichiko used her wide blade to cover her chest as she suddenly realised that her white kimono had gone see-through thanks to the rain, and it was drawing attention to her lack of a bra.

Ichiko couldn't help but burst out laughing as the previously maniacal and fearsome hollow had been reduced to a half-naked blushing school girl.

"Fuck you!" The embarrassed hollow bellowed.

"Sorry to spoil your fantasy, but I don't think you have the 'equipment' for that anymore." Ichiko doubled over and laughed even harder as every inch of white skin visible on her counter-part (which was a lot thanks to the rain) turned bright red.

Ichiko tried to regain her composure as she realised the rain was still hammering down, but the sun had broken through a little.

"I'm gonna kill you!" Hichiko made a move to charge forward at her mirror image and got ready to lash out, but stopped dead in her tracks when a voice broke through the cacophony of the rain.

"Now now girls, there's no need to come to blows over this." The pair turned to see who the new arrival was, and Ichiko instantly recognised the tattered black coat of her Zanpakuto's spirit.

"Old Man…ZANGETSU?!?" Ichiko's jaw dropped as she got a proper look at her mentor and realised that there had been some definite changes.

"It's LADY Zangetsu now." Said the spirit with a slight indignant tone.

Before Ichiko stood a good looking middle-age woman with tousled long hair, orange shades and the familiar ragged coat that blew in a non-existent wind. Her coat was open and revealed quite a tight fitting, revealing white shirt (that was as see-through as Hichiko's robes) with an upturned collar, and a long black skirt with a slit up one side all the way up to her hip, and knee high black boots.

Many thoughts ran through Ichiko's mind as she stared flabbergasted at the 'Milf' (as Keigo would have referred to her) in front of her, but one thought was louder than the rest.

_'Yup,' _she thought,_ 'I'm definitely still a guy on the inside.'_

"Sorry buddy," Ichiko jumped at the sudden voice at her ear, and she realised it was her hollow, "You don't seem to have the 'equipment' to fully appreciate the view anymore."

"I'm glad that you cheered up a bit." Said Lady Zangetsu, stalling Ichiko in her attempt to throttle her hollow.

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"Because of this dramatic change your heart has been in turmoil, and when you're sad it rains in this world." Zangetsu motioned towards the sky and frowned sadly, "And I hate the rain… now more than ever." She picked at her shirt, peeling the wet material off of her more than ample bosom.

"But when you were laughing before you realised your situation wasn't that bad and things got better." Ichiko looked around her and saw that the rain hadn't eased up since she'd gotten here.

"Better how? It's still raining."

"True, but when you cheered up I got this." She smiled and wiggled the parasol Ichiko suddenly realised Zangetsu was carrying, "Want to get out of the rain?" Ichiko didn't need to be asked twice and hurried under the cover of the umbrella.

To fit them both under the small piece of cover they had to get close, and although Ichiko would never admit it, she wasn't exactly sad about the fact.

"Ichiko, I know this is hard on you-" they both turned at the sound of sniggering and looked at the maliciously grinning Hichiko.

"Its not gonna be 'hard' on you anymore, if you catch my drift."

Zangetsu scowled at the hollow and for the hundredth time today, Ichiko had her face slammed into someone else's cleavage as Zangetsu hugged her comfortingly.

"Comments like that are the reason you're not allowed under the umbrella!"

"Au man!" Hichiko turned away grumbling and kicked her heels in annoyance.

"Where were we? Ah yes. Ichiko, I know that your current situation has come as a big shock to you, but you have to understand that it may be a while before it's fixed, and running away from the fact that you're now a girl isn't going to help. If you continue to struggle against the change your heart will continue to be in chaos, and if it remains that way then I won't be able to help you when you fight." Ichiko sighed as she realised that it was true that she was acting like it was all a bad dream, and she felt so tense and afraid because of it.

"Accept the circumstances and trust that it will all be sorted out in the end, and for now maybe you should try and actually _enjoy_ the fact you're a girl." Ichiko looked up at Zangetsu with an expression of puzzlement, and despite that fact that she had noticed Zangetsu had seemed to be showing more emotion now that she was a woman than when she was a man, she was still surprised to see a slight mischievous smile on the older woman's lips.

"Enjoy it? What do you mean?" Zangetsu's smile widened just a little and Ichiko realised what she meant and turned bright red.

"Y-you don't mean-" Zangetsu leant forward and put a finger under Ichiko's chin and tilted her face towards her own.

"You should try experimenting with yourself. You've never been able to get this close to a female body before, so you should take full advantage of the opportunity to…explore it." Zangetsu's lips came dangerously close to Ichiko's as she leaned in further, and Ichiko trembled with a mixture of fear and excited anticipation. She was unable to move away, which she wasn't sure she wanted to.

"Ooooo, this looks fun, can I join in?" They both turned to look at Hichiko who was leaning in as well with an evil grin as she made to grab a hand full of each of the women in front of her, but Ichiko fell over out of her reach and Zangetsu closed the umbrella and slammed it into the hollows stomach with amazing speed, and had it back up before the hollow hit the ground.

"That's it! I'm permanently removing your umbrella privileges!"

Ichiko lay on the floor, as bright a shade of red as she'd ever been and stared up at Zangetsu as the older woman straddled her and squatted down.

"I think its time for you to go, remember what I've said and try to relax more. If you want I could give you a massage before you go."

"Hey! No! Th-that's fine! I'll be ok without a massage!" Ichiko tried to scramble backwards but was pinned down and at the mercy of Zangetsu's slowly approaching hands.

"By the way, just so you know, you're under threat in the real world."

-------------------------------

"D-don't, I'm wet!" Ichiko shouted as she suddenly jerked awake in her bed own bed, and stared at the ceiling as she figured out that she was back in the real world.

"Glad to hear it! It'll make things more exciting!" Ichiko looked up at the headboard on her bed as she heard the voice and tried to scream in surprise as she saw Kon grinning.

Before she could react, the stuffed toy head butted the Shinigami Seal he was holding and the pill containing his soul suddenly shot out and landed square in Ichiko's gullet.

Ichiko was jettisoned upwards and then came crashing down onto the hard wood floor.

"Wow! This feels great!" said the unmistakable (yet distinctly more feminine) voice of Kon, "Your boobs are so juicy! 36D if I'm not mistaken!"

Ichiko shot to her feet and glared at her own body with the fires of hell in her eyes, as she watched the interloper molesting her private parts.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Ichiko muttered low and dangerously.

"Well you're too frigid to take advantage of the wonderful gift that's been given to you, so I thought I'd take over for a while and… hehehe… break in your new body."

Ichiko growled at the perverted look on her own face and lunged at Kon abruptly.

"The hell you will!" Ichiko grabbed at the Shinigami Seal but missed as Kon swiped it up and held it out of reach as he made for the window, but Ichiko grabbed his ankle and pulled him back in as she scrambled over her own body and wrestled the mod soul for the seal.

"Give me that!"

"Never! I've not finished having fun yet!"

After a lengthy struggle Ichiko managed to slam Kon's face onto the mouth of the plushie and held him face down in a precarious position. She held the Shinigami Seal firmly in her hand, ready to bring it down on her own body.

Rukia stirred from her peaceful sleep as the sound of fighting broke through her barrier of dreams, and provoked her warrior's senses and brought her back to consciousness.

She slowly sat up and rubbed the sleep from her eyes as feminine grunts and groans could be heard from the bed next to her. She yawned and stretched lethargically, but she became suddenly alert as she heard things she wish she hadn't.

"No! Wait! Not yet!"

"You're going to give it to me! And you better give it to me quick!"

"Even if you make me spit, I'll just swallow again!"

When she looked her face flushed bright red at the scene before her, and she struggled to find the words to say.

"What the hell…?"

Kon and Ichiko paused and looked up to see Rukia sat up in her bed with a look of extreme shock on her face. They both blinked in confusion for a few moments before realising what they'd been saying, and that Ichiko had Kon over her knee with the Seal held by the cord in a position that looked as if she was about to spank her real body with it, which was apparently French kissing a stuffed toy. The fact that they were both sweaty from the struggle and they were both blushing from the embarrassing situation really didn't help any.

"You're a perverted as he is!" Rukia covered her eyes but peaked through her fingers as they both struggled to get into a less compromising position and shouted in tandem.

"I-IT'S NOT WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE!"


	6. Chapter 6: SwimSuits and OneLiners

**Author's Notes: Sorry for taking so damn long to post this up, I got distracted by games, then work got REALLY hectic over Christmas, and then I got writers block, but here it is! Chapter 6 and I hope you all enjoy! **

**By the way, please check out my good friend Von Doomsatan's story, hopefully he'll write more soon (Write more soon, dammit!). **

**EDIT: I apologize for the apparent lack of paragraphs, despite droping it down multiple lines between them Fanfiction still doesn't like it, so instead i've seperated paragraphs with lines, and segments with the "plus" sign.**

**-++++++++++++++++- **

Ichiko shifted uncomfortably as she walked, and picked at the itchy new skirt and clingy bra. So far she hated wearing girl's clothes as a girl more than wearing guy's clothes as a girl, and that was saying something considering that these actually fit her properly.

"Stop playing with it!" chided Rukia as she slapped Ichiko's hand away as she readjusted her bra for the millionth time since they left the house.

"I can't help it, it feels unnatural to have something this clingy on." The fledgling female grumbled in reply.

"Well if it's bothering you THAT much then why not take it off?" Rukia let out an exasperated sigh and stretched, working the last of the morning's fatigue out of her muscles. After last night's fiasco Rukia had found it hard to sleep, mostly because despite the protests of Kon and Ichiko she couldn't get the image of Ichiko spanking her half naked body while in spirit form, out of her head.

It was an image that would be both an eternal source of mirth and cold sweat inducing nightmares for years to come.

"That's a great idea!" Matsumoto said, throwing in her sixpence worth as she threw an arm around the shoulders of Rukia and Ichiko.

"Who needs a bra? Right, Ichiko? After all, I do fine without one, don't you think?"

Ichiko risked a glance down at Matsumoto's ample bosom out of the corner of her eye then quickly looked away with a slight blush and a stern expression.

_Yup… still a guy. _

"You don't wear a bra? I would never have guessed…" she said dryly, but the sarcasm drifted over Matsumoto's head the same way many things did.

"This is going to be fun! Your first day at school as a girl! Aren't you excited Ichiko-chan?" Rangiku chirped as she ruffled Ichiko's already tousled hair.

"Don't call me chan!" Ichiko hissed as she slapped away the buxom red-head's hand and grimaced at the thought of what embarrassments her friends would put her through.

"Ok, a few ground rules." Ichiko halted the others and turned to face them. She might as well stop them from doing anything before they got the chance, "Don't tell ANYONE that I'm Ichigo, ok? I'm Ichiko, Ichigo's relative staying while he's away. And do NOT say to anyone I've had a sex change! Or so help me god I will offer you up to Urahara as test subjects!"

All those present nodded although Ichiko got the impression they weren't exactly listening, so with a resigned sigh she trudged off to what would no doubt be a hellish day at school.

**-++++++++++++++++-**

"RAAAAANGIKUUUU-SAAAAAN!" the shrill cry pierced air and eardrums alike as the one who emitted it flew through the air towards the well-endowed lass, only to be met with a causal back-hand from Matsumoto, who didn't even acknowledge the existence of the now downed Keigo.

"Well… that's the first annoyance of the day dealt with…" grumbled Ichiko as she stepped over the twitching pervert and moved along with her friends.

"So you've got to do the whole introduction thing, huh?" said Rukia as Ichiko stopped just outside of their classroom door and leant against the wall.

"Yeah… you guys go ahead, I have to…" she paused briefly and shuddered, "get into character…"

The others went on ahead and Ichiko tried to come to terms with the next challenge brought about by Urahara's meddling.

_"Ok, Ichiko… Ichigo… Gah! Whatever! Ok self, we need to act like a girl…" _

"Hi, I'm Kurosaki Ichiko, its super-sweet to meet you all!" she chirped to herself for practice in the abandoned corridor. Upon hearing herself the urge to vomit nearly overtook her.

_"Ok, that was TOO girly…" _

Before she could try any other permutation of stereotypical female behaviour the door next to her slid open, and for a moment her heart accelerated at the thought that her bad attempt had been over heard, but it was just her teacher who beckoned her inside.

"We're ready for you now, Kurosaki-kun."

Ichiko nodded and stepped hesitantly into the class behind her teacher, her resolve suddenly breaking. The thought of so many people looking at her in what she saw as a compromising form didn't exactly help her confidence.

_"It'll be fine," _she told herself, _"You've known these people for years, and it'll be just like speaking to them normally. And they won't treat you any differently than when you were a guy… ok, that's not exactly a good thing..."_

"Would you care to introduce yourself to the class?" Ichiko snapped out of her daze when the teacher spoke and smiled softly at the other kids in front of her. _"Just take it easy."_

"Hi, I'm Kurosaki Ichiko, you already know my…cousin… Ichigo… and I hope I can be as good a friend to you as he was."

_"Well that went well, very natural."_

"Huh, I hope she's BETTER than Ichigo, he was a douche…" Ichiko shot a glance at the boy who spoke, but bit down her rage. Ichiko's soft and welcoming smile twitched a little in annoyance, but she managed to keep it together, after all, she'd always known that quite a few people didn't like him.

"Bah! Who cares if she's a better person? Look at that rack!" even without looking Ichiko new who that comment had come from, no other person could be so without shame as to say something so brazen.

"Can't you let the new kid settle in before you try to get into her panties, Chizuru?" snapped Tatsuki, causing the spectacled girl to jump up and glare at the karate champion.

"You're just jealous because you could never hope to fill out a bra like she can!"

Tatsuki turned bright red, although Ichiko didn't know whether it was due to rage, or the same embarrassment she was feeling.

"I'd have thought you'd have learnt your lesson about keeping quiet by now, but maybe you need another ass kicking to remind you!"

"Maybe she wants me, ever thought of that? Not everyone's as frigid as you are… or as butch."

Everyone in the room gasped and froze as they heard the one word they knew not to utter in Tatsuki's direction on pain of death. The entire class stared at the ebony haired lass as her eye twitched with barely contained rage. Everyone waited with baited breath to see what level of hell the martial arts expert would unleash upon the unruly lesbian.

Chizuru grinned and stood proudly as she saw that Tatsuki was paralyzed by her comment, although she didn't realise it wasn't embarrassment that was holding Tatsuki back, but instead it was her desire not to get a criminal record.

Chizuru counted this as a victory, usually she would have been punched in the gut or doubled over by a brutal kick to the groin, but with the teacher in such close proximity she didn't dare do a thing.

-----------------------------------

The feeling of elation didn't last very long, an old familiar sensation ran through her face, it was the feeling of a hard impact and the taste of her own blood, but before she went cart wheeling across the room she saw that Tatsuki was still stood statue still in front of her.

"W-what…?!" she stuttered as she tried to stop the flow of blood coming from her nose while she came to a halt in a pile of tables.

"No one calls Tatsuki frigid, OR butch… she's athletic." Ichiko hissed dangerously as she hoisted Chizuru up by her collar.

As a guy it had been unthinkable to hit a girl, but now that the playing field was technically levelled, she relished the opportunity to beat the crap out of the irritating lesbian.

"Calm down everyone! Kurosaki-san, kindly put down Chizuru-san, as annoying as she is we have a schedule to keep." At the teachers request Ichiko put down Chizuru and brushed herself off.

"Now then, if you'd like to take a seat, Kurosaki-san, anywhere will do, and we'll begin."

Ichiko was about to go to her old seat when she noticed Tatsuki subtly motioning to the seat beside her, so she took the invitation and sat, after all, other than Rukia and Matsumoto (Toshiro didn't exactly count), 'Ichiko' technically didn't have any friends, and Tatsuki seemed like as good a start to regaining her companions as any.

"Thanks for the help, but I could've handled that myself." Tatsuki whispered across to Ichiko once the teacher had begun to talk and write on the board.

"Well… she was embarrassing me too…" Ichiko said, drawing a small smile from the ebony haired girl.

"It's good to see there's another girl here who's not afraid to show her muscle. Lets be friends, ok?" Ichiko stared at the hand that was offered to her, and after a moment she shook it and returned Tatsuki's smile.

"That'd be great…"

Not far behind them Keigo and Mizuiro sat in silence, still stunned by the quite impressive (although brief) cat fight that had just taken place.

There's a law of nature that states that in a situation as tense as this, someone, some where is statistically going to bring the unspent rage that is left over from such a fight, crashing down on them by saying something stupid.

That person was Keigo.

"That new girl sure is violent…" Keigo whispered a little too loudly.

"Yeah, reminds me of her cousin quite a bit."

"Yeah… very quick to anger too, good job I didn't point out to Chizuru that Ichiko has a better ass than Tatsuki too-"

The last word had barely left his mouth when two fists connected with his face at the same time, and he was sent spiralling into the back wall of the classroom by the combined rage of Tatsuki and Ichiko.

"Damn perverts." They said in tandem.

-----------------------------------

"Dammit! Must've left it at home…" Ichiko realised as she looked through her bag that she'd forgotten her class schedule, and turned to Tatsuki, "Do you know what the next class is?"

Tatsuki flicked through her day planner and smiled widely as she found the right date.

"Alright! Its gym class next!"

"Swee-!…eeet…" Ichiko's enthusiastic answer trailed off at the end as she realised that gym class meant that she'd have to get changed with the other girls.

The prospect of seeing girls naked had never terrified her so deeply.

"Damn…" she muttered as the images flitting through her mind made her cheeks tint pink.

"Anything the matter?" Tatsuki inquired upon seeing Ichiko's expression.

"Oh… nothing…"

**-++++++++++++++++-**

**Meanwhile… lost somewhere in Karakura town… **

The sun had come up hours ago and people had awoken and ventured to work and school while Grimmjow and Ulquiorra had wondered aimlessly through the streets, searching for somewhere to rest their heads, but alas their mission to acquire residence somewhere was running into trouble due to one simple flaw.

They had no idea what the hell they were doing.

-----------------------------------

Ulquiorra had been told by Gin before they departed Hueco Mundo that they should go and find a place to rent as soon as they got there, but the moment they'd set foot in the living world Ulquiorra realised that he didn't have the slightest idea what renting was.

Grimmjow and Ulquiorra had stricken a silent truce sometime after midnight as they had run out of energy to continue their nearly constant insults and barbs, and had resorted instead to occasional glares in the other's direction while they sought a place to stay.

-----------------------------------

Grimmjow had suggested sometime just as the sun was coming up, that they search through the survival packs that Gin had 'lovingly' packed for their journey, to see if there was any clue as to where to find a place to stay, and to their surprise they found a large tent with instructions. They'd managed to erect it correctly, and had stared proudly at their achievement, but they forgot to move it from the middle of the road where they'd built it, and so just as they'd prepared to get in, the flimsy construct was run over by a truck and left it tatters.

They'd left the ragged bit of material behind in the road and proceeded with just the poles because, 'you never know when a spear might come in handy.' as Grimmjow put it.

-----------------------------------

"Fuck this shit!" Grimmjow shouted at the top of his voice as fatigue and irritation finally got the better of him, "We need to find a place to stay right this fucking second or else I swear I'm gonna kill every piece of shit human in this town!"

"Stop your whining, lets take one last look in the bags, we might find something we missed in the dark." Grimmjow forced himself to calm down and dropped the heavy duffle bag off his good shoulder and began to rummage through in on a street corner while Ulquiorra sifted through his own.

"What the fuck did that gimp put in here? Desert survival guide? Arctic clothing? Animal track guide? Where did he think he was sending us, on an extreme wilderness weekend?!"

"Hmmm, this looks interesting." Grimmjow's eyes went wide as he watched his pale faced companion pull out a long metallic object from his bag and hold it up to the light.

"What the hell is that??"

"I think its called a 'gun', its what humans use instead of cero or kido, its no where near as powerful as our usual weapons, but it should do for now." As Ulquiorra turned the large revolver over in his hands he read the kanji out aloud, "0.45 Magnum… 'Point this way'… 'squeeze this'… 'make human die'… 'love, Gin'. Sounds simple enough." Grimmjow grinned widely at the hunk of metal as Ulquiorra pointed it at a tree and stared down the sights.

"Even if it's not that powerful it sure looks beefy… say… do human weapons have names?"

Ulquiorra thought for a second before looking over the pistol, and finally he found something carved on the handle.

"Filthy Harold… what a trash name…"

"All right! This is more like it!" Grimmjow returned from his own pack wielding a massive rusted machete and gave it a few test swings.

"Well, I suppose if we're careful we can… 'Requisition' a place to stay without compromising our situation."

"Sounds good to me, so where should we try?" Grimmjow looked around as he shouldered his pack and carefully slid his new found toy into his belt, but to him all the houses in the area looked the same, and none of them looked particularly interesting to him.

"That one." Ulquiorra pointed towards a house over to their left were an elderly lady slowly pottered around in the window.

"She shouldn't put up much resistance."

-----------------------------------

Knock knock knock!

"Who could that be?" the frail old lady said to herself as she finally registered the loud banging at her front door.

Knock knock knock!

"Coming, dear!"

KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK!

"Keep your shirt on, deary! I can't move as quickly as I used to." Finally she reached the front door and undid the latch, and as she swung open the heavy wooden door she saw two tall strange looking men stood in the porch.

"Can I help you gentlemen?" Ulquiorra drew the heavy pistol from his pocket and levelled it at the old lady's head without as much as a glimmer of remorse in his deep green eyes.

"W-what are you doing??" the old lady felt her heart quicken as she stared down the gleaming barrel of the 'hand-cannon' pistol. Ulquiorra stared into her eyes and with a stony voice he said matter-of-factly:

"Taking out the trash."

Just as the old lady tried to back pedal and run, the 4th Espada squeezed the trigger and with a bass thump the frail woman dropped to the floor with half her head splattered on the floor and wall.

"Not too bad…" Ulquiorra muttered as he held the pistol up and rubbed his wrist that hurt slightly from the snap of the recoil, "Too much mess for my liking through."

Grimmjow peered over his shoulder and nodded appreciatively at the mess in front of them, and the soul of the old woman that cowered in the corner with a broken chain.

"May I?" he asked with a grin.

Ulquiorra pocketed the gun and walked inside, inspecting the interior with little interest.

"Go ahead, I'm not hungry."

"Pl-please! Take anything you want! Just don't hurt me again." begged the lady's spirit.

"My my, it ain't your lucky day is it?" Grimmjow sneered as he drew closer and licked his lips, "Two deaths in one day, but don't worry, THIS one's permanent!"

-----------------------------------

The old lady screamed as Grimmjow swung the front door closed, but no one would hear her out here, away from the Shinigami.

**-++++++++++++++++-**

"It's a great day for swimming. Not too hot, not too cold, and not too breezy. Are you ok, Ichiko-san? Your nose is bleeding." Tatsuki stared at the red head in puzzlement.

"I-I'm fine…" Ichiko managed as she wiped the little trail of blood off of her deathly pale face.

**_"Ah man, what a show that was! So many boobs! You should consider turning lesbian, Ichigo… sorry, ICHIKO. You could easily get half of all that pus-" _**

"Shut up! I don't need YOUR advice on sex!" Ichiko hissed to herself at the interjection of her darker self. Luckily no one overheard.

-----------------------------------

"Ok girls! Line up by the side and keep quiet, I need to do roll call." The teacher began to call out names as the girls scrambled for positions next to their friends and talked amongst themselves.

Ichiko stared down at her swimsuit feeling thoroughly embarrassed, wearing a tight bra under a relatively loose blouse was one thing, but wearing a skin tight swim suit was another.

_"This feels perverted…"_ she picked at the material around her boobs but stopped after a minute. The snap of elastic material was getting her nipples hard, which was not the best thing to happen in front of her class mates and a vengeful lesbian.

"Rangiku-san! What the hell are you wearing?!" gasped the teacher, catching Ichiko's attention, and as she looked up she nearly got another nose bleed.

"Is something wrong?" said Matsumoto obliviously as she stood there in an extremely revealing yellow bikini.

"Yes there is! That… that… THING is not your school swim suit!" Rangiku twirled on the spot like a fashion model, making Chizuru faint and fall into the pool while the other girls stared at the buxom faux-student with a mixture of jealousy and annoyance.

"But this looks so much better! Those navy blue one pieces aren't very sexy, plus, mine didn't exactly fit, so I brought this."

"Grrr…" the teacher straightened her glasses and swallowed her boiling rage, "Fine! Just get into line!"

"Subtlety isn't exactly one of her strong points." Whispered Rukia, and Tatsuki and Ichiko nodded in agreement.

"Lets carry on… Kuchiki Rukia."

"Here."

"Inoue Orihime."

"Here."

"Hitsugaya Toshiro."

If Ichiko had been drinking at that moment in time she'd have choked and spat it out, but instead she just stared at the teacher in astonishment, and along with Rukia and Inoue shouted:

"WHAAAT?!"

"Yes… that is a rather… boyish name for a girl…" said the teacher, glazing over the fact that she'd spoken to Hitsugaya several times in the past and knew full well he was a guy, unlike the rest of the class who had understandably had little contact with the albino youth, who had remained reclusive during and between classes, that and he was usually overshadowed by Matsumoto's breasts which were often perched on his head.

_"How does that guy not have neck problems?"_ Ichiko thought to herself before snapping back to the issue at hand.

"But isn't-" Matsumoto cut Ichiko off as she leaned over with a grin and whispered.

"We've avoided gym class so far, but he was being bitchy this morning so I told him they were making us do it or we'd get expelled."

"But, why is he with the girls?" asked Rukia, to which Matsumoto grinned even wider.

"I told him that the boys and girls were swimming together."

"Where is she? Does anyone know?" the teacher asked aloud while scanning the line of girls.

"She's just being shy." said Matsumoto with a smile, "Captain Hitsugaya! Come on out! No need to be embarrassed!"

"Captain…?" The teacher cocked a brow in bemusement at the honorific.

"She was the Captain of her old high school's swim team." chirped up Rukia, adding to the amusing lie.

"Ah! There you are, Toshiro-kun!" all the girls turned to stare at the doorway that led to the changing rooms and saw white hair sticking out from behind the door frame.

"Any time today, Hitsugaya-kun!" Toshiro reluctantly stepped out into the open and Ichiko's eyes went wide as she struggled to retain her laughter.

In front of the class stood the great and powerful child prodigy Captain Hitsugaya Toshiro, in a girl's swimming costume.

"How did you get him to-?" Rukia asked between fits of giggles.

"I told him it was unisex." winked Rangiku.

Hitsugaya quickly shuffled forward, beet red face and all, and squeezed in between Rukia and Matsumoto.

"Why Captain Hitsugaya… hehehe… you look so cute in that swimsuit." Rukia bit her lip as she snickered, making the young boy turn an even brighter red.

"I'll kill you for this Matsumoto! I thought it was odd that there were no other guys in that changing room! You lied to me!" his rage was barely kept in check, but no matter how furious he was, none of those in the know could take him seriously. Even Inoue was having problems trying not to laugh.

"Now you know how it feels." chuckled Ichiko with a malicious edge to her voice.

"Today we're going to be working on our front crawl," said the teacher after she'd eventually finished her roll call, "Now I need someone to set the pace, any volunteers?" A few hands shot up as Ichiko looked around, keeping hers firmly planted by her side, one of them was Tatsuki's of course, and one was… Toshiro's?!

"Ah! Hitsugaya-kun! Eager to show us why you were captain of the swim team at your last school huh?" Ichiko looked closer and noticed that Matsumoto had wrenched his arm up for him, and Toshiro was looking extremely flustered and confused.

"Captain of the swim team? Wha-"

"Do your best, Captain!" Matsumoto shoved him towards the edge of the pool while the other girls in the class hollered and cheered for him to show them what he was made of, which he was definitely not happy about.

"Aaaaand go!" said the teacher as she started her stop watch.

"But I don't-" his protests were silenced abruptly as the instructor shoved him into the water.

"Sensei!" called a student from the doorway that lead back into the school, "The head teacher said he wanted to see you right away!"

"Really? Ok, I'll be right there. Tatsuki, can you time Hitsugaya-kun for me? Everyone has to try and keep pace with her!" she tossed Tatsuki the stop watch and strolled off into the school.

"H-HELP!" shouted Toshiro as he floundered in the water.

"Is he ok?" Ichiko looked down at the splashing cross-dresser feeling more than a little concerned, as he rapidly lost his battle to keep above the surface.

"Oh! I just remembered!" chirped Matsumoto with a little bounce and a smile, "He can't swim!" Rukia and Ichiko stared at her in astonishment as her smile suddenly faded upon the realisation of what she'd just remembered.

"Oh dear…"

"You mean Captain Hitsugaya Toshiro, wielder of the most powerful ice and WATER type Zanpakuto in all of Soul Society, can't swim?!" Ichiko hissed out of ear shot from Tatsuki and Inoue.

"Yeah, it is a bit odd isn't it?" mused Matsumoto.

Hitsugaya finally disappeared under the surface and Ichiko turned around to look for help only to see the other girls staring helplessly as the albino's motionless gigai sank to the bottom.

"If he drowns he'll be ok, right? After all, he's already dead."

"Well… technically yes, although a gigai's like a normal body," interjected Rukia, "and I'm not sure what effect such a thing as drowning will have on the spirit inside of it, after all, cuts and bruises translate over to the spirit body from the gagai.

"Plus I don't think it'll look very good if his body dies in the middle of school, even if his spirit body survives."

"One of us has to do something!" Rukia and Matsumoto both stared at Ichiko plainly for a long moment.

"I can't swim either." said Rukia at last.

"Me neither." added Matsumoto.

"You WHAT?!" Ichiko's jaw dropped in astonishment as she looked from one Shinigami to the other and back again.

"Dammit! Fine! I guess I'll have to rescue him!" taking a deep breath Ichiko dived into the pool and began to swim down as fast as she could to Toshiro who was unconscious on the bottom. Ichiko grabbed his arm and kicked off the bottom, but found that they didn't move. Looking down she noticed that Toshiro's swimsuit was caught on a loose screw sticking out from a drain cover and she cursed inwardly.

_"Oh come on! I'm gonna drown too at this rate!"_ Ichiko pulled as hard as she could, trying not to panic as she ran out of oxygen, but eventually Toshiro's swimsuit tore free and the suffocating strawberry paddled frantically towards the surface.

As she hit the open air she gasped and swam for the pool side, and while the other girls cheered she hoisted the unconscious Hitsugaya up onto dry land.

"She's not breathing!" said one of the girls and Tatsuki put her ear to Hitsugaya's lips to make sure.

"She's right; some one needs to perform CPR."

"I'll go get the teacher!" said Orihime as she ran off into the school while everyone else crowded round.

"Does anyone know CPR?" asked Tatsuki, but where ever she looked she saw shaking heads.

"Kiss a girl? No way!" said one of the girls and blushed brightly.

"Did someone mention kissing girls?!" as expected Chizuru's ears pricked up at the mention of forbidden love, but got a straight kick to the stomach from Tatsuki for her troubles.

"We need someone to bring her back to life, not smother her even more!"

"Didn't your uncle show you how to perform CPR, Ichiko?" pointed out Rukia, and suddenly all eyes turned to her, making her turn as red as her hair.

"I… er…"

"Come on Ichiko! She might die if you don't help her!" everyone began to cheer her on, much to her discomfort, and reluctantly she conceded.

"Ok, ok, I'll give it my best shot."

_"Oh man… I hope I know what I'm doing…"_ she grimaced as she looked down at the deathly still young man and held his nose and parted his lips.

_"Ok, this is a medical procedure, not a kiss, this doesn't make me gay."_

Taking the plunge she took a deep breath and put her mouth to his and blew as hard as she could.

No sooner had she had finished her breath Toshiro's eyes shot open and looked into Ichiko's. Both of them suddenly became overly conscious of the position that they were in and due to shock and surprise their lips locked in an accidental kiss, and at that very moment they both saw a bright flash and looked to where it had come from to see Matsumoto holding a camera.

"Ichiko saves the day and seals it with a kiss!" she declared joyously, and Toshiro and Ichiko shot apart as quickly as they could, with Ichiko washing her mouth out in the pool and Hitsugaya coughing up a lung full of water.

"WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING!?" raved Ichiko as Matsumoto wound the camera on with a smile.

"And… where the hell were you keeping that?" she added in bafflement.

"Erm… can I get a copy of that?" asked Chizuru who had appeared behind Rangiku, far out of the reach of Tatsuki.

While Rangiku and Chizuru discussed prices Hitsugaya recovered and shot to his feet with an expression of pure rage.

"When we get back home I'm going to get you fired, you insubordinate bi-"

"Hey! Her ass is showing!" declared one of the girls, and suddenly everyone turned to stare at Toshiro's rear.

"Oh dear… the screw from the drain." Ichiko suddenly remembered that she had ripped his swimsuit to get him free.

Toshiro quickly covered his ass, but it was too late, Matsumoto had already taken another photo, and moments later a shrill scream went up from amongst the crowd of girls.

"I can see her… his… IT'S A GUY!!!"

Despite herself Ichiko looked down a little further and winced.

"You tucked it back?"

"I HAD TO! Do you have any idea how hard it is to fit into one of these with a-"

"I can't say I've ever tried." Ichiko cut in while she began to try and wash the image of Hitsugaya's boy package out of her mind with pool water.

**_"Well, at least we know that his Zanpakuto is the only big thing about him."_**

The returning teacher was met with screams of 'Pervert!', 'Cross dresser!' and 'Panty thief!' from the angry mob of young women as they chased the thoroughly embarrassed Hitsugaya out of the pool area, leaving the poor instructor very confused.

"Errr… class dismissed."

**-++++++++++++++++-**

**Back at Las Noches mk. II… **

Grimmjow and Ulquiorra shifted uncomfortably as they stood in front of the smouldering shell that was their new residence while fire fighters went about extinguishing the many small fires that still burned in the wreckage.

"Well gentlemen," said the chief of the fire department as he pulled off his helmet and wiped the soot from his brow, "We think we know what started the blaze. From what we found it looks like it started in your microwave, although we're a little confused and I was hoping you could shed a little light on what happened, y'see we found a pile of charred wood under the microwave and we think it has something to do with the fire. Do you guys know anything about it?"

Grimmjow didn't bother looking the man in the eye, instead he stood there staring at the blackened remains of their house, feeling more than a little annoyed at the fact that he'd left his machete inside and it was probably ruined beyond use by now.

"The microwave fell down the stairs…" he muttered when he realised that the fire chief was staring at him expectantly, it seemed as though he wasn't even going to try and get an answer out of Ulquiorra who stood stock still and glared loathingly at the human, and looked as approachable as the Chernobyl reactor.

"The… microwave… fell down the stairs?" the confused man said eventually, not quite believing what he was hearing.

"Yep."

"And then caught fire?"

"Yeah."

"And then went back to the kitchen and set fire to the rest of the house?" the fire chief stared at Grimmjow with a slight smile as he expected the blue haired gentleman to turn around and say he was joking, but when no such revelation came his face drooped in disbelief.

"I was under the impression that we'd agreed to use that as the excuse for why your arm was broken." interjected Ulquiorra without breaking his eyes away from the fire chief.

"Pfft! What the hell are you talking about? That's a crap excuse for my arm! It never caught fire!"

Ulquiorra thought about saying something, but decided against trying to correcting Grimmjow, who after he'd set his mind to believing something, was nearly impossible to convince otherwise.

Grimmjow was surprisingly intelligent, but his intelligence was often outvoted by his animal instinct, resulting in such poor reasoning as this.

-----------------------------------

"It fell down the stairs, caught fire and then we put it back where it ignited the rest of the house. Do you have a problem with that, Trash?" Ulquiorra's piercing eyes killed off any attempt to argue against the preposterous story by the fire chief, who involuntarily took a step backwards.

"Er…n-no, sir! I-I just needed to know w-what to tell the insurance company!"

"Is there anything else… Trash?" Ulquiorra shouldered his bag which he'd managed to rescue and turned his back on the fire chief, thinking that the man wasn't moronic enough to speak again, but if there was one thing about humans that annoyed Ulquiorra the most, it was their inability to take a hint.

"Well er… there was one thing… you never did explain the wood…"

**One hour ago… **

Ulquiorra sat on the couch and thumbed through a guide to eating in the wild while Grimmjow attempted to get to grips with the odd appliances in the high tech kitchen, and neither of them seemed to be any closer to solving the problem at hand.

-----------------------------------

"Any idea how to cook yet?" shouted Grimmjow through the doorway while poking at one of the army ration packs Gin had put into their survival bags.

"There is little to learn in this book, it mostly concentrates on killing your food."

"Well, no need to worry about that, this thing looks pretty dead," Grimmjow had cut the top off of the package and grimaced as he poked the mushy contents with a fork, "If it was every alive to begin with…"

"Here's something." The pale Espada exclaimed with as much excitement as he could muster… which wasn't any at all.

"To cook your kill you need to prepare a camp fire. It looks simple, there are even diagrams." Ulquiorra moved into the kitchen to join his partner in crime.

"Hmmm, this package says this thing is the quickest way to cook it." Grimmjow poked at the microwave that was the only thing in the kitchen that even remotely resembled the symbol on the back of the silver sachet, "Which do we use?"

Ulquiorra looked up from the book at the microwave and noticed that it was mounted on the wall about a foot and a half off the work surface.

"The…" he squinted at the small print of the sachet in Grimmjow's hand, "Microwave, must be some kind of accelerator. Put the food inside, I'll just be a minute."

-----------------------------------

A short time later Ulquiorra had returned from the living room with an arm full of wood he'd gotten from pulverising the coffee table, and set about building a camp fire under the microwave.

"Ok, now we just light it with these matches. How long does it have to cook for?"

"It says warm for five minutes." Ulquiorra lit the small fire and they both stood and watched the gradually building flames with a sense of accomplishment, although when the flames engulfed the microwave and the cupboards above it, they began to get a little concerned.

Grimmjow stared at the spreading blaze that was rapidly engulfing the kitchen and then exchanged a panicked look with his superior.

"I think we put it on too high a setting…"


	7. Chapter 7: Rejections a BitchBoob Issues

**Author's Notes: Sorry again for ANOTHER long interval between new chapters, but unfortunately getting thrown out of your job kinda stops the flow of creative juices.**

**I've gotten used to my unemployment now though, so I should start updating every week or two from now on.**

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Ichiko had quite a predicament (apart from the obvious), she had discovered a fool proof way to get rid of her 'ailment', but despite the solution being simple, _obtaining_ the solution was anything but.

During their maths class Ichiko had become aware that in little over an hour news of her apparent 'heroism' had spread throughout the school, and as such girls thought she was cool and guys wanted to do things to her that she didn't particularly want to think about, and it was during a confrontation with one of the boys who'd been more vocal that most about his intentions towards her, that she'd thought up the solution to her problems.

"Hey there, Kurosaki-chan," said the smarmy git with his slicked back hair, which made him look like he was attempting to be a 1920's gangster and failing miserably, "You're quite rough and ready, have you got a little Osakan in you?"

'_Rough and ready? Wow… great compliment…'_ Ichiko thought as she gritted her teeth in annoyance and avoided looking at the fat fool.

"No, I don't." she grumbled as she balled her fist, ready to punch him if he tried anything.

"Do you want some?" the line was so cheesy that it could have been spread on crackers, and even as she grimaced she wondered why she hadn't seen it coming, but Ichiko had thought no one to be as stupid as to use it or so stupid as to laugh at It as the boy's friends were doing. She tried to ignore the gut wrenching cliché, but when he decided to emphasize the bad pun with a few crotch thrusts that came dangerously close to her ear, she snapped and turned on him like a pissed cobra with fangs bared.

She wanted to send a message out to the other would be suitors that she was not to be messed with, and she had the just the put down to do it with.

"I don't think any girl would be satisfied with your… 'Little Osakan', I've… heard things, from the boys locker room. Word is you come up more than a little short in the showers." The boy rocked back on his heels and his friend's laughter changed targets when his cheeks flushed red.

"H-hey! It's cold in those showers!" he argued feebly as Ichiko stood up and waggled the tip of her pinkie finger.

"Must be like the arctic to make it THAT small. Now run along until you're a REAL man."

The boy quickly shuffled off with an expression which was a perfect blend of frustration and embarrassment, kind of like a bulldog chewing a wasp. As Ichiko turned back to her seat she was welcomed by cheers and applause from the group of fans she'd acquired since the pool incident.

"Wow! Good going!" said Tatsuki with a grin and a pat on the back which made her suddenly conscious of her performance and made her blush.

"That was impressive, Kurosaki-kun!" said Inoue as she leant over Tatsuki, and Ichiko realised that she hadn't spoken to Orihime since she'd had her encounter with Urahara's 'penis-b-gone' powder, "I wish I was as good at rejecting guys."

"You actually notice them?" said Tatsuki with genuine astonishment, "I thought you were usually too spaced out to realise."

"That's it!" Ichiko shouted abruptly, making all eyes turn to her and in turn her cheeks turned very strawberry like… but without the bumps or stalk.

"What's it?" inquired Orihime who voiced everyone's puzzlement.

"Oh…er… nothing! Just er… figured out this problem…" she trailed off with a weak laugh and buried her face in her book in pretend concentration until everyone had looked away.

'_**Way to go, partner. You get a chance at a new start, y'know, make people believe you're not crazy, and what do you do? You start shouting random shit in the classroom. People are gonna start thinking that stupidity is a hereditary trait of the Kurosaki family.'**_

'_Remember what happens when I get upset?' _growled Ichiko at the creeping darkness in her mind, _'It rains in your world, so if you REALLY want it to become a 24/7 wet t-shirt contest in there, then keep pissing me off!'_

Hichiko went quiet for a while as if thinking, and then in an overly enthusiastic tone her darker side began to cheer:

"_**Go Ichiko! Do your best! Execute your retarded- I mean, your master plan!"**_

"_You're a dick."_

"_**Closest you'll get to one in a while, partner."**_

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"So then, what's this idea of yours?" queried Rukia as she sat to one side with Ichiko on the roof at lunch time.

"Well…" Ichiko began with a mouthful of bean paste filled pastry, much to Rukia's disgust, "The solutions simple, I just have to get Inoue to use her powers to 'reject' my ailment right? If she can repair Chad's arm, surely getting rid of the effect of some crappy powder should be no problem for her." Ichiko looked thoroughly pleased with herself for coming up with such a smart idea, but Rukia couldn't help but wipe the smile off her face.

"That's assuming that she wants you back as a guy. Y'never know, she might prefer you as a girl." Rukia grinned widely as Ichiko nearly choked on her food and gave her a deathly scowl.

"Don't even joke about that…"

"All jokes aside though, there is a few problems."

Ichiko had been afraid that those words would be spoken, she had wanted her plan to be perfect for once, but deep down she knew it was impossible, so she grimaced in anticipation of the no doubt well founded criticisms and motioned for Rukia to carry on while she chewed.

"Well, for one, Orihime-chan doesn't know that you're actually Ichigo, which is no doubt gonna be one hell of a shock for her, and knowing that poor girl it could take her days to get her head round it. Two, there's the possibility that she could get offended by the fact that you didn't tell her you had changed straight away, and Three, she could think that you didn't tell her just so that she wouldn't try to cover herself up when she got naked in the changing rooms in front of you."

Ichiko fell into a sort of trance as she remembered back to the smorgasbord of naked female flesh, and the rows of bouncing teenage breasts, and their exquisite, nicely trimmed pu-

"Er…" Rukia tapped the glazed over Ichiko on the forehead, snapping her out of her forbidden fantasies, "You're adding your own sauce to your pastry."

"Huh?" Ichiko looked around in a daze for a few moments before looking down at her lunch, and she saw that it was doused with liberal amount of blood from her fantasy induced nosebleed.

Rukia rolled her eyes and spoke aloud what Ichiko was thinking.

"Still a guy…" she tutted.

After they'd finished their food and Ichiko had cleaned the blood off her face, her and Rukia discussed ways which they could ask Inoue for her help, but everything seemed either too outrageous or too much of a risk to their friendship.

"The way I see it is, out of all the friends you have, she's the one you least want to mess things up with." Rukia said as she crossed two more suggestions off the list she'd drawn on a napkin.

"Tell me about it…" the red head muttered as she stared off towards the horizon, "I suppose I could just risk it and just come out and ask her."

"I'd suggest keeping that as a last resort, after all, Urahara is still trying to find a cure," Ichiko couldn't help but snort at that one, "and we've still got 12th Division to try."

"Sounds like a plan, I suppose. We'll go see the old man after school, see if he's managed to pull anything out of his ass… other than his head."

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Rukia stumbled into Urahara's store with a very annoyed expression that was aimed at Ichiko who was the one doing the pushing. After last time Ichiko just didn't trust Urahara's store, she expected a new booby trap to be around every corner, and she wanted someone else to trip them before her, and the unlucky person to be voted into the position of 'point man' was Rukia.

"Is it clear?" asked the strawberry girl as she nervously poked her head past the door, only to have it slammed on her cranium, "YEOUCH!"

"It is now… asshole."

Together they stepped further inside, but there was no sign of the suspect shop keeper, although they both grew concerned when they heard what they thought to be screaming coming from the trapdoor in the back.

After a brief argument and a few punches, Ichiko went down the ladder first, and as they neared the bottom they saw the unmistakable figure of Urahara crouched at the edge of the Shattered Shaft.

"It rubs the powder on its skin, It does this whenever it's told." they heard the shopkeeper say as they drew closer.

"Let me out of here you friggin' psycho!" shouted the occupant of the deep stone well.

"It rubs the powder on its skin or else it gets the hose again." As they silently stood behind Urahara they noticed he was holding Yoruichi in her cat form in his arms, and stroking her absently while looking down the shaft.

She sleepy looking black cat meowed contently, seemingly oblivious, or uncaring of what Urahara was doing to the person, who they figured was no doubt Renji, who was stuck down the hole.

"Yes it will, Precious it will get the hose!"

"Ok, hat-n-clogs! I'm putting on the powder! If you let me out of here, I _promise_ I won't leave the toilet seat up again!"

"Now it places the power in the basket." The scruffy blonde mewed down at the pineapple, ignoring his plea for help.

Ichiko leaned close to Rukia as they watched the scene in front of them in puzzlement, and whispered to her companion.

"Is he quoting-?"

"Uh-huh." She nodded with an amused grin.

"Pleeeease! I wanna come up!"

"It places the powder in the basket."

"COME ON!"

"PUT THE FUCKING POWDER IN THE BASKET!"

"Er… excuse me, Buffalo Bill," Ichiko said with a loud cough, "I hope we're not interrupting anything."

Urahara yelped like a little girl and shot to his feet, nearly knocking Yoruichi into the pit. The sandy blonde turned to face his new visitors with a nervous smile and let go of the rope he was hauling up.

"K-Kurosaki-san! Kuchiki-kun! I er… didn't expect you to be visiting!" a few moments later there was loud crash as the no doubt heavy basket, hit Renji full on in the face.

"What the- OOF!"

"Is he-?" Rukia began, trying to look round the shop keeper and into the pit, but Urahara took them both by the shoulder and led them back towards the ladder.

"Oh he'll be fine, don't worry about him."

"It's in my eyes! It's burning my eyes!"

"Are you sure? He sounds like he's-"

"He's just being cranky; he's not been sleeping well."

"I wonder why…" muttered Ichiko dryly.

He pushed them back onto the ladder and hastened their accent as the screaming continued, and as Rukia helped Ichiko back through the hatch the red head whispered,

"I think I've figured out why they threw him out of 12th Division, he makes Mayuri look sane!"

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Urahara poured his visitors some tea as they sat in his lounge and discussed the progress he had made with his research into a cure, which hadn't been much as it turned out.

"Well it's been slow going I'm afraid, I ran into a few hiccups which made me have to restart my work a few times."

"What kind of hiccups?" asked Rukia as she fended off Ichiko who was quietly asking her to test her tea to make sure it wasn't poisoned.

"Well… nothing major…" he said, evidently hesitant to go into the details.

"Nothing major?!" interjected Yoruichi as she entered the room and sat with them in her human form, "He thought he found some of the gender-swap powder."

"He did?!" chirped up Ichiko with a delighted look on her face, but her glee where ever Urahara was concerned, was always destined to be short lived.

"I said he THOUGHT he did… turns out it was dandruff… and he wasted half a day researching a cure for it."

"On the upside I've concocted a marvellous new medicinal shampoo which will bring in a pretty penny or two!" Urahara's grin faded rapidly under Yoruichi's glare, and so he went back to quietly sipping his tea.

"So you've made NO progress then?" Ichiko sighed sadly, although she really shouldn't have expected a result in only a day, especially from Urahara, but she couldn't help but wish for this ordeal to be over and done with already.

"Well… there was a _little_ progress…" said Urahara uneasily. Evidently he wasn't sure if mentioning it was going to generate false hope. Either that or he was afraid that Yoruichi might do something if he said anything weird again.

"How little?" inquired the strawberry girl who was growingly rapidly annoyed with Urahara's games.

"I managed to make some what of a HALF gender swap powder."

Rukia stared at the perverted store owner with a blank expression as she awaited a further explanation, but Ichiko couldn't help but shiver in disgust as the word 'Futanari' entered her head.

"Put simply, it causes you to grow breasts."

Ichiko opened her mouth to speak, but before she could Rukia had her clenched fist held in front of the red head's face and an angry expression carved into her features.

"Make a single damn comment and so help me god I'll punch you in the balls."

"Huh Yeah, good luck with that." Ichiko said with an amused snort.

"Damn! Ok, I'll punch you where your balls used to be!"

"I wasn't going to say anything. You're getting too paranoid, Shorty."

Rukia growled angrily as Ichiko patted her on the head with a derogatory smile, but she bit back her rage and turned back to Urahara.

"So if Ichiko uses that will it remove her boobs?"

Urahara thought for a few moments then nodded with a confident smile.

"Based on the results of my experiments-"

"Wait wait wait," interrupted Ichiko, "Experiments?"

"Oh yes, I tried it out on Renji first." Urahara looked a little confused when Ichiko nearly threw up, although then again he didn't see the image that went through the young girl's head.

"Er… anyway, so yes, based on my experiments I believe it would reverse _that_ effect at least."

"Hmm… that's not much of a solution." Ichiko pondered as she looked down at her chest and wondered if being a boobless girl was better than being a well endowed girl.

"I suppose you're right, after all I think you'll have a tougher time if you go around looking like a flat-chested twelve year old like Ruki- GAK!"

Urahara doubled up in pain as Rukia lunged over the table and slammed her fist in between the shopkeeper's legs, and despite the fact that Ichiko no longer had her 'family jewels' she still felt it on some level and cringed in sympathy.

"The warning went for you as well!"

Ichiko leaned over the table and gave a worried look at the twitching blonde.

"Is he alright? I think you might have hit him a bit hard."

"He's fine." Rukia replied sternly.

"Are you sure? He looks like he's turning green."

"It's a reaction to the tea."

"I'm not sure it is-"

"It's a reaction to the tea." Rukia growled at Ichiko with a burning fire in her eyes and a shaking clenched fist that she could tell was ready to lash out at her own nether-regions and quickly backed down and crossed her legs. Even if she didn't have the same 'equipment' as before, something told her that such a powerful blow would hurt just as much.

"Ok! I believe you! Now I think its best that we go arrange a meeting with Mayuri before you try to turn Hat-n-Clogs into a eunuch." Ichiko suddenly stopped and considered if that'd be such a bad thing, but shook off the though as she saw that Rukia had taken her contemplation as a go ahead order to remove the poor guy's wedding tackle, and started dragging her out of the store.

"Yoruichi, honey" Urahara cooed when his voice descended back into the range audible to humans.

"What is it?" the dark skinned lass said as she cradled the downed shop keeper sympathetically.

"Will you kiss it better?"

"OH FOR THE LOVE OF GOD! ATLEAST WAIT TILL WE'VE GONE!" boomed Ichiko from the doorway.

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Ichiko was glad to be home despite her father's insanity, which seemed to have increased ten fold now that he felt he needed to 'Impress' his 'new daughter' and had made for a very awkward dinner, but her room was her sanctuary and once she was inside she could be at peace, even if she had to share that peace with Rukia.

"Is my life ever going to be nice, simple and normal?" she sighed as she undressed regardless of Rukia's presence and flopped down on her bed in her uncomfortable underwear.

"No, it's not, and ever it if was you'd just complain that it was too dull."

As Ichiko sat up and began to take her bra off to relieve the discomfort she had been feeling all day, Rukia threw a t-shirt at her to cover her modesty.

"For someone as uptight as you are when it comes to nudity, you sure don't mind stripping off in front of me." Rukia said with a bit of a smirk.

"I keep forgetting I'm not alone in here anymore." Ichiko slipped the shirt over her head and finished 'freeing the twins' while Rukia attended to her own change of clothing, but she stopped as she was unbuttoning her blouse when she saw the strawberry girl open a drawer by the side of her bed and pull out an odd shaped bundle of duct tape.

"What's that?" she asked with a cocked brow.

"Kon."

Rukia couldn't help but laugh as she noticed the bundle of plastic tape squirming.

"That's cruel… but kinda funny."

"Well, if he won't stop being a bastard…" Ichiko ripped off the piece of tape over the bound plushie's mouth and quickly silenced the scream that followed by ramming her fingers down his throat and pulling out the pill inside.

"Planning on going somewhere?" Rukia questioned as she turned around topless, nearly giving Ichiko a nose bleed, but the ex-male managed to rein in her over-active imagination and looked away.

"Er… you may want to put those away. I'm giving him my body while I'm off training with Matsumoto."

Rukia slid on her own t-shirt and made a disgruntled sound. Evidently she was still sore about Ichiko not asking her for lessons in how to fight with boobs in the way, although as she looked down at her chest she understood why… not that she'd ever admit that.

"Can you keep an eye on him while I'm out? I don't want to come back to him doing… things…" Ichiko tore the rest of the duct tape off the now limp plushie and discretely used the stuffed lion to wipe away the small trickle of blood from her nose.

"I guess I can babysit for the evening…"

"Thanks, it'll be a great help, just… try not to beat my body up too badly, ok?"

"No promises."

Ichiko downed the pill and was flung out of her body with a loud pop and a static discharge, and a few moments later her body sat back up with a gigantic grin.

"You're letting me in your body?! Ooooo let the fun begin!" Ichiko seized the mod soul by the wrists before he could fondle his temporary body, and received a menacing glare.

"You're going to have no fun while I'm out, Rukia will see to that. All you're going to do is make sure my dad doesn't think I'm dead."

Kon pulled his arms out of Ichiko's grip and crossed them under his boobs.

"Spoil sport…" he grumbled quietly.

"I'll be back in two hours."

A moment later and Ichiko had leapt out of the window and was just a bounding dot on the rooftops in the distance, and Kon gave her a choice hand gesture as a farewell.

"Asshole!" Kon slammed the window shut in a last act of defiance and turned back to Rukia with a mischievous grin.

"So Onee-chaaaan, what shall we do for our girly night in? Pillow fighting in our underwear? Maybe some mud wresting? Ooooo, followed by a nice hot _soapy_ bath together so we can clean each others sweaty, dirty bodies!" Kon licked his lips lecherously and giggled with a sinister glint in his eye as Rukia smiled Indulgently.

"I've got a better idea, now that Ichiko's gone, why don't we try something… kinky?" Rukia's voice was sensual and full of dirty intent which took Kon totally by surprise, but when he recovered he grinned even wider at the prospect of making filthy love to the object of his long lived affection.

"Ooooo I love the sound of that! What did you have in mind?"

"Well… how about we use these?" Rukia pulled two pairs of handcuffs out of her school bag and swung them in front of Kon's face.

"This is gonna be-" suddenly a light bulb pinged on in the mod soul's head and his face dropped when he realised Rukia plan. He'd thought it was be too good to be true for Rukia to have succumbed to his desires so suddenly, and he was right, but by the time he tried to jump away Rukia had already handcuffed his hands to the bed.

"Now you're going to stay here like a good little boy and keep your appendages to yourself, ok?"

"You bitch! You tricked me!"

"Guys are so easy to manipulate. It's a good thing Chizuru left these in the shower room."

"You stole them?" Kon blinked at Rukia in momentary confusion. He'd never seen her as the stealing type.

"Well I figured that if I didn't take them then she'd probably have tried to chain Orihime up. So I felt it was my duty as a friend to remove the threat." Rukia smiled as she felt justified in her actions.

"You're just a thief…." Kon said blandly, which earned him a sharp jab to the boob from the ebony haired Shinigami.

"YEOUCH! You're getting too into this for a person who doesn't want to do it!"

Kon began to wriggle around and flail his feet as he tried anyway he could to get out of the handcuffs.

"Stop thrashing about! You're going to either damage the room or yourself!"

"Let me out dammit!"

Seeing that something was going to get broken at this rate, Rukia jumped on top of Kon and straddled his hips, pinning him down as she crossed her arms and rested them on the angry strawberry's chest.

"Am I going to have to tie your feet down as well or are you going to stay still and be quiet?"

"Why not just let me go? I'll be good I promise!"

"Wow… these really are nice boobs…" she said, ignoring Kon's begging when she realised how soft Ichiko's boobs were under her arms. "I wonder if Urahara…" Rukia trailed off and began to prod and poke her prisoner's breasts as Kon squirmed and squeaked underneath her.

"GAH! Stop being so rough!"

"Why couldn't Urahara go and put boobs like this on my gigai?" Rukia slid her hands under Kon's t-shirt and grabbed her breasts unceremoniously and began to examine them.

"WAAAH! Cold hands! Y'know it's hard to get horny when you're stabbing at me like a frog in a science class!"

"Be quiet dammit!"

"You're not as gentle as I thought you'd be!" Kon continued to struggle under Rukia, but the dainty girl was heavier than she looked and held the mod soul down firmly.

"Stop wriggling! Or do I have to tweak your nipples?" Rukia gave them a bit of a twist to emphasise her point.

"GAH!"

"Next time I'll do it harder." Rukia looked around suddenly as she heard a creak and noticed the door swinging open, and in the doorway stood Isshin and Karin with their mouths hanging wide open and Isshin had a trail of blood running from his nose.

Rukia and Kon looked at them in bafflement for a few moments before realising they had just been grinding their hips together while 'Ichiko' lay handcuffed to the bed in her underwear and a t-shirt, while the similarly dress Rukia had her hands up the red head's shirt.

"Err…." They both turned bright red and struggled to think of something to say when Karin suddenly found her voice again.

"What… the hell… is going on…?"

Rukia struggled for an answer, but she was too embarrassed to think straight, so she blurted out the first thing that came into her head.

"Er…. Science project?"


	8. Chapter 8: Another Day at the Office

**Author's Notes: FINALLY got round to 'finishing' chapter 8, it was a ball ache I can tell ya. It's hard to be funny when you're getting bounced from one craptastic job to another, that's my only excuse for the lateness, hopefully my funny gene will be back in place next week and I can get to work straight away on Chapter 9, which hopefully won't take 2 months this time.**

* * *

"Two hundred and thirty centimetres!!" shouted Grimmjow as he woke with a start and sat up on the couch he'd been using as a makeshift bed. In front of him stood Ulquiorra, who despite having the same expression of deadpan inconvenience on his face as always, looked a little baffled by Grimmjow's choice of exclamation.

"What is?" he said blandly as the groggy blue haired Espada pealed a discarded Mars bar wrapper from his face and threw it on the floor.

"What's what?"

"What's two hundred and thirty centimetres?"

Grimmjow stared at Ulquiorra as if he'd just proposed a bungee jump but without the cord.

"What are you talking about?"

"…Never mind…" Ulquiorra rolled his eyes and walked back behind the breakfast bar that the couch was pressed against and continued to poke at the strips of meat in the frying pan.

"Smells good," said Grimmjow as the smell of food pushed aside his grogginess, "What is it?"

"The rest of the little girl." Ulquiorra gestured with his fork at the partially devoured corpse in the corner while tipping the meat onto bread.

"None of the man left?" Grimmjow wrinkled his nose at the thought of the little girl's bland meat but accepted one of the plates offered to him anyway.

"You burned him to a crisp, remember?"

"It's called Char Grilling, I saw it on the TV." Mumbled the Jaguar Arrancar through a mouthful of prepubescent girl ((I don't get to say THAT every day!)).

"It's called immolation. You totally ruined him." Ulquiorra was being decidedly more civilized with his eating habits than his companion.

"Ah well…" Grimmjow finished- sorry… _fisted_ the rest of the sandwich down his throat, and after nearly choking to death and having Ulquiorra ignore his mimed pleas for help, looked up at his superior and noticed something very odd.

"Why are you dressed up so smartly?" he queried as he noted the well fitting shirt, jacket and trousers.

"I found a job, it's only a one off but it pays well. Plus it requires minimum effort so I can dedicate more time to monitoring the Shinigami."

"How can you monitor them if you're working?" Grimmjow thought for a few moments, and then noticed just how smartly Ulquiorra was dressed, and combined with Grimmjow's masterful use of twisted logic and an entire night of staring at the TV he was hit with an epiphany… or an idea… hell I don't know.

"You mean… your job is… James Bond?!" he said somewhat shocked and excited, but the only reply he got was Ulquiorra staring at him in puzzlement as to how he'd reached that conclusion.

"… It's at the school that the Shinigami attend as part of their cover."

"Oh…" Grimmjow looked like a kid who'd been told he wasn't allowed a cookie, "…So you-"

"No I'm not James Bond infiltrating a school…"

"Dammit! So what is it then?"

Ulquiorra stared at his subordinate for a while, unsure if he should tell him or not, after all if he said anything that made him look weak he would have to tolerate Grimmjow's constant snide remarks until they got back to Mundo, then he could soundly thrash him.

"I'll be a model…" the pale faced Arrancar mumbled into his tea.

Grimmjow looked up at his pale superior with an expression most commonly associated with being smacked in the face with a partially defrosted haddock when you least expect it.

"I'll be a model for a 'Life Drawing' class." Ulquiorra continued upon noticing his associate's bafflement.

"Life Drawing? Do you know what that is?" Grimmjow wanted to grin but he managed to hold back the urge.

Ulquiorra took Grimmjow's question to mean that he didn't know what it was, and although he didn't like to admit it, he didn't either.

"I just have to let some little pieces of trash draw me for an hour and a half, that's all I was told."

Grimmjow allowed himself a small smirk as he turned to the TV and began flicking randomly through the channels.

"Well, I hope you don't 'come up short'." Ulquiorra gave him a curious look as he stood up and got ready to leave. Evidently he didn't realise he'd be required to strip naked for the class.

"Are you implying that my skills are insufficient?"

"Of course not, 4th Espada-sama!" Grimmjow grinned cheekily as he settled on a program about baboons fornicating, "I'm sure you'll give those little bastards 'every inch' of yourself."

Ulquiorra really didn't like how Grimmjow was being so complimentary and polite all of a sudden. It made him feel uncomfortable… kind of like he'd just sat though a twenty four hour marathon of Ben Affleck movies. An experience he would never forgive Aporro for, and which had led to Aizen banning movie night.

He thought of questioning Grimmjow about what he meant but he realised what time it was and headed for the door.

"Oh, by the way!" shouted Grimmjow before the pale Arrancar could open the door.

"As 'good' as you are, it could be dangerous with those Shinigami there." Grimmjow rustled around inside the survival kit he had beside the couch, and after a moment he located what he'd been looking for and threw a tiny plastic and metal object to Ulquiorra.

"What's this?"

"It's a transceiver; Gin loaded them up for us. Put it in your ear and press on it when you want to speak. It's got a long range so I'll be able to hear you from here, call if you run into any trouble."

Ulquiorra was beginning to get a little afraid; Grimmjow was showing his serious and practical side, that meant one of three things: One) He was in heat, Two) He sensed danger and was getting serious for battle, or Three) He'd 'accidentally' eaten more of Halibel's incense sticks. None of which Ulquiorra would be particularly happy about, especially the incense sticks… they gave a good trip and he wanted one for himself.

Ulquiorra pushed the little device into his ear and made sure it worked then finally headed out the door and to his inevitable embarrassment.

* * *

"Ok, everyone, take your seats!" all the students slowly shuffled to their stools and sat behind their canvases with all the enthusiasm of a eunuch at a brothel, and looked up at their teacher who was decidedly more awake than they were.

"Today we're going to be doing some life drawing." She said with a smile and most of the class grumbled at the prospect of another dull item to draw.

"Not more fruit is it, sensei?" Whined Keigo as he chewed on the base of a paintbrush idly.

"Oh no, it's something _far_ more interesting." The few students who were actually paying attention to their teacher found her sudden roguish grin more than a little disturbing.

"Interesting how?" Ichiko asked as she hesitantly raised her hand, unsure if she _really_ wanted to know the answer.

"Well, I _did_ say 'Life' drawing, so as you might expect, we've got a real life model to draw."

Keigo shouted in excitement as his imagination went wild and he started to add his own red paint to his pallet.

"Woooo! We're gonna get to draw a hot babe!" he started to do a little dance in his seat and Chizuru joined in, evidently she was equally as excited at getting to stare at the supple frame of an attractive young maiden.

"Shut up you two!" Tatsuki shouted as she threw a paint brush at each of them to silence them, "She didn't say it was going to be a girl!"

"That's right, in fact it's a man." Suddenly their teacher blushed and muttered under her breath, "…and what a man he is…"

"What was that, sensei?"

"Oh nothing, nothing! Anyway, I'll go get him." The teacher quickly shuffled off into the storage room and after a few moments she came out blushing more than before with a pale young man in a bathrobe and tousled black hair.

"Everyone, this is Mr. Schiffer, he'll be our model for today."

The whole class stared at Ulquiorra, and true to himself he stared right back at them, but this time his face wasn't placid and lacking interest as it usually was, this time he wore an expression of barely controlled annoyance and embarrassment.

"_I'm going to kill Grimmjow when I get home…" _he thought to himself, _"He knew I'd have to strip off and he didn't tell me… Ah well… I suppose it's too late to back out now."_

"You can put your robe over there, Mr Schiffer, and then please sit here once you're ready."

The class stared at the model intently with a mixture of apprehension and anticipation as Ulquiorra bit the bullet and untied his robe.

"_Now or never…" _he thought to himself as he dropped the robe from his shoulders and bearing himself to his audience.

When Ulquiorra's body came into view everyone's jaw dropped, and quite a few nosebleeds stained canvases crimson, and upon seeing that there was 'more' to Mr. Schiffer than she first thought, the teacher fainted and collapsed on the floor.

"W-What the hell is that thing?!" one guy cried in jealousy.

"Is that thing real?!"

"I think I've just turned gay…" whimpered Keigo ashamedly.

"I think I've just turned straight…" Chizuru moaned disturbingly.

"My god! You should be glad you're not a guy anymore or else he'd _definitely_ put you to shame!" whispered a heavily blushing Rukia to a stunned Ichiko.

"He could give me half of that and we'd both still have an impressive package!" Ichiko whimpered. Never before in her life had she felt as down trodden as she did now.

It was bad enough to be constantly reminded that she didn't have her manhood anymore whenever she went to the bathroom, but to have it literally dangled in front of her face was almost soul crushing.

Eventually the teacher picked herself up off the floor and straightened herself up and snapped the class out of their stupor with a clap of her hands.

"N-now now class, let's not get…distracted! This is a double lesson, so we'll have a break half way through, now, get drawing!"

Slowly the students picked up their tools and began frantically scribbling, painting or scratching away at their canvases while Ulquiorra sat there, as still as a statue with his manhood bared to the entire class, while a horrible feeling grew in his stomach that is familiar to any guy who's ever had a prostate exam, and so to try and quell this feeling one thought ran through his head repeatedly.

"_Don't get an erection, don't get an erection, don't get an erection, don't get an erection, don't get an erection…"_

Orihime had been blushing furiously the whole three quarters of an hour that they'd been drawing the naked man in front of them, and she could barely chase away her embarrassment long enough for her to look at him so that she could see what she was meant to be drawing with her charcoals.

"_Oh dear, this is so embarrassing! I've never seen a guy naked before… well, apart from my brother, but that doesn't count. Oh man, I don't think I can do this for much longer, it's bad enough having to look at…at… it, but having to DRAW it as well?"_

Inoue came out of her thoughts to realise that for the last minute she'd been staring directly at the model's groin and that he'd noticed her staring, and was staring back. Orihime let out an embarrassed squeak and quickly hid behind her canvas, but her sharp movements made her hand slip and she accidentally smudged her sketch.

"Oh dear! I hope I've not ruined it!" she licked her finger and began to try and wipe away the excess charcoal, but as she did she just smeared it more.

"Wait a minute…" as she stared at the smear she'd made under his eye something ticked over in her mind… somehow it looked familiar.

Inoue drew the line under the picture's eye more prominently, and then drew another under the other eye.

"Ok! Time for a break, people! Put down your tools and go and stretch your legs!" Inoue turned to look at the other students getting up and reluctantly did the same while she puzzled over why the picture looked so familiar.

Ulquiorra waited until everyone, including the teacher, left the room and then got up and stretched.

"Being in a gigai sucks…" he muttered as he flexed his muscles and stepped down off the podium to stretch his legs, "Although that's what I've come to expect from something made by trash."

Out of curiosity and maybe a hint of vanity he decided to take a look at the drawings of some of the students, and as he walked past each shoddy rendering he muttered the word 'Trash' and moved on to the next.

Ulquiorra stopped at one canvas and couldn't help but break his usually stern exterior and raise an eyebrow in sheer puzzlement. In front of him stood a canvas with a very crappy drawing of himself striking what could only be described as a Super-man pose with a Chappy bunny over his crotch.

"What the…" he trailed off as he eyes drifted away from the bizarre picture.

The naked Arrancar was about to return to his seat on the podium when one of the canvases caught his eye, it wasn't a particularly amazing rendering, but it wasn't bad, but it wasn't the picture's quality that caught his eye, it was his eyes that caught his eye, and the two streaks under them, just like he had on his spirit body.

"_This means trouble…"_ he thought to himself, he realised that the girl who sat at this canvas, 'Orihime' or something like that, was onto him, he had thought the expression on her face before she left was suspicious and now he knew why. She was at the crater and she must have recognized him. This could jeopardise the mission.

For the first time ever a feeling of dread settled in his stomach as he realised that another first could take place. Him failing a mission.

The 4th Espada suddenly became aware of voices at the end of the corridor leading to the room and he realised that the students must be coming back from their break.

"Grimmjow! Are you there?" Ulquiorra whispered as he pressed his ear piece.

"An Ostrich!" exclaimed Grimmjow who sounded like he was eating something while speaking.

"…What?"

"Two hundred and thirty centimetres is the average height of a male Ostrich, I finally remembered."

"Oh right." Replied Ulquiorra, genuinely fascinated for a moment until he remembered why he was calling.

"We don't have time for animal facts! The Shinigami are suspicious of me, one of them is close to working out who I really am. I need you to create a distraction so I can get out of here and destroy this picture too."

"I'll be down in half an hour." Grimmjow answered lazily, "Robot Chicken is on in a minute."

"Now, Jaegerjaque… or do you want Aizen-sama to take your other arm too?"

"I'll be there in five."

Ulquiorra quickly took his finger away from his ear and sat back down in the same wooden pose as before. No sooner had he sat down than the doors burst open and the students flooded back in, many of the girls were now giggling and blushing while looking in his direction, and he'd also noticed that the teacher had unbuttoned her blouse to show off more of her cleavage which she was incessantly thrusting in his direction.

This was going to be the longest five minutes of his life.

As Orihime sat down in her seat and once again looked at her canvas she took on a serious expression. Obviously the hamster was running as fast as it could on the wheel while she tried to figure out why the picture looked so familiar, and for every moment that she stared at it Ulquiorra got more and more nervous, and being nervous while naked has certain effects which Ulquiorra seemed to be currently oblivious of.

Orihime suddenly looked up at Ulquiorra as if she could taste his fear of discovery, and for a brief moment their eyes locked and both of them were hit with horrid realisation.

Ulquiorra realised she had figured out where she had seen him before.

Orihime realised that the life drawing model had gotten an erection.

The tense Arrancar noticed the orange haired girl's eyes drift downwards and so he followed suit, and suddenly he wished he'd asked Gin to not make his gigai fully 'operational'.

Another agonising minute later Orihime had disappeared back behind her canvas and Ulquiorra had managed to suppress his personal growth with a combination of force of will and mental images of the time he saw Nnoitra messing around in Halibel's closet.

He'd never been able to listen to the song 'I'm every woman' again without shivering in disgust.

He kept a close eye on Inoue, watching for any sign that she might have finally figured out his identity, but he couldn't see her expression because of the canvas in front of her.

He didn't need to see her face though to know she'd finally figured it out. A moment later he saw her excitedly gesturing to the other Shinigami, all of whom hurriedly slinked their way over to where she sat, and a girl with red hair whom he'd never seen in any of the reports joined them.

'This is it' he though 'I've failed the mission.' The thought was horrid, almost as sickening as the thought of dying. To think he'd failed Aizen-sama was a shame he'd never wanted to bare, but it seemed inevitable as the Shinigami group made their way over to the girl who'd worked it all out.

But fate has a way of pulling your gonads out of the fire before you roast your chestnuts.

With the sound of tearing masonry, the wall behind Ulquiorra exploded and through the newly created hole flew a Harley Davidson with a dark figure sat atop it, and as it slammed into the ground and screeched to a halt Ulquiorra noticed that the rider had acrobatically stood up on the seat and was posing like Michael Jackson in a black suit and shades, with the word "G-MAN" printed in white across the back of his jacket.

All the students had run for cover when the wall detonated, but the teacher (who was still dazed by the sight of Mr. Schiffer 'standing to attention') was still sat in her seat, although she was covered in dust and bits of wall and was looking completely baffled and terrified.

"Er… who are you?" she managed at last as she looked up at the statuesque rider.

"I am a Government Man! From a Government!" he bellowed cheerily as he twirled round and flashed the teacher a smile full of sharp teeth that were almost as bright as he sky blue hair, and he threw a badge at her that was clearly just a drawing of badge stuffed in his wallet.

"I have to confiscate that!" he shouted and pointed at Ulquiorra's crotch, "It's too long and must be corrected."

Grimmjow looked up at the crowd of cowering teens and canvases and pulled a large sack from somewhere on the motorcycle.

"I also need to confiscate these." He had begun bagging all the pictures when he suddenly noticed one that was sat in front of the particularly timid looking Michiru. He grabbed it and stared at it in abject horror and fascination as it depicted Ulquiorra and another boy from the class doing something that Grimmjow had never thought possible without the removal of several ribs and a lot of oil.

"ESPECIALLY this one!" he gave the girl a disgusted look and put his fist through it for good measure.

"Wait a minute…" the teacher suddenly exclaimed as she picked up the badge and stared at it, "We're in Japan… and this is an FBI badge… and you spelt bureau 'byoorow'. You're not really from the Government are you?"

Under the teacher's scrutinizing gaze Grimmjow cracked and smacked her upside the head with the sack of canvases and leapt for the bike.

"Quick! Jump on!"

Ulquiorra just stared at him for a few moments, unsure whether he should get on or pretend he didn't know the walking embarrassment gesturing at him.

Resigning himself to humiliation (although he didn't know why he cared what the kids thought) he jumped onto the back of Grimmjow's motorcycle and reluctantly put his hands on the other Arrancar's sides.

"You'll fall off like that, hold on tighter."

Ulquiorra shifted forward in the seat and pressed himself right up against his comrade, drawing a surprised 'meep!' from Grimmjow and a crimson flush of his cheeks.

"Not THAT tight."

Ulquiorra disembeded his manhood from his subordinate's lower back as he cranked the throttle and the bike rumbled over the rubble and into the cold air outside.

Back inside the students slowly came out of their hiding spots and stared at the gaping hole in the wall where the blue haired psychopath had escaped with the well endowed model, and each was left wondering what they'd just experienced, or whether they'd really just experienced it.

"Is my life ever destined to be normal?" Ichiko sighed as she tried to come to terms with the amount of obscure goings on that seemed to hunt her down.

"What do you mean? That seemed almost average." Said Rukia who was picking rubble out of her hair and was evidently annoyed by the theft of her latest butchery of art.

"A blue haired government Hell's Angel just blew open our classroom, busted moves like Michael Jackson, stole a bunch of half finished drawings, assaulted out teacher and kidnapped the naked God of Penis. Even by our standards, that can only be described as bat-shit crazy."

Rukia pondered the point for a moment and then slowly nodded.

"I see your point; your life really is messed up."

"Y'know… after this I'm actually quite looking forward to going to 12th Division. Even that freak Mayuri is more down to earth than this place."


	9. Chapter 9: Perversion of Science

**Author's Notes: ** Oh dear god... taken so long to write this, what's it been now, nearly 10 months? Writer's block is a bitch.... Well here's 9, and 10 will follow once I've corrected the spelling mistakes. I've no idea when 11 will be done though.

Sorry again for taking so long, and thank you to everyone who has expressed interest in the story, and of course, to Von Doomsatan for beating me about the head until I wrote this.

* * *

The soft tinkling of a bell announced Ichiko and Rukia's nervous entrance into the main building of the 12th Division, although neither of them stepped fully into the foyer.

Ichiko looked around like a paranoid spy looking for an anvil that was waiting to drop on her, but nothing sprang.

"What are you doing? Get in already!" snapped Rukia who slapped Ichiko on the back, making her stumble into the surprisingly pristine and professional entrance hall.

"Damn it, don't push! I was being cautious! The way you described this place made me think it was going to be like something out of Indiana Jones!"

"Indiana…what?" Rukia looked rather puzzled at the reference and slowly stepped in after she decided that if there were any traps Ichiko would have set them off first.

"Never mind…" sighed the strawberry eunuch when she realised Rukia hadn't watched many of the films modern people would consider 'classics'.

"Good afternoon!" chirped a cheery receptionist who had been watching their little argument with bored fascination and a plastic smile, "How can I help you?"

"We have an appointment to see Kurotsuchi-taicho." Rukia replied as she shoved past Ichiko who mumbled "What's with the shoving?" among other less savoury things.

The receptionist looked down at the computer on her desk then back up at the pair.

"What name is it under?"

"Kurosaki Ichigo." She ducked behind the computer again and after a few moments of frantic typing she popped up with another well rehearsed but incredibly fake smile.

"You're a little early, but Kurotsuchi-taicho should be ready for you soon. You can go through to his office and wait for him, it's the fifty first floor down, end door on the right, you can't miss it."

"Thank you." Rukia said as she took the guest passes handed to her and threw one to Ichiko.

"What are these for?" Ichiko asked as she turned the piece of plastic and it's disturbing looking wriggling clip over in her hands.

"You'll see." Replied the receptionist in an unsettlingly devious tone.

"Come on!" growled Rukia who yet again shoved her companion, this time into the waiting elevator, making her trip and fall face first into the wall.

* * *

The elevator slowly descended into the ominous depths of 12th Division's Headquarters with its two passengers. An oddly aggressive Rukia, and a brooding Ichiko who was trying to stem the flow of blood from her nose with a tissue whilst also trying to adjust her somewhat revealing shihakusho so that she didn't feel like she could fall out of it at any moment.

The silence in the small metal box was beginning to become stuffy and uncomfortable, like a fart in a diving suit, and like that 'proverbial' diving suit, Ichiko decided to break it regardless of the hazardous consequences.

"Why are you so bitchy today?"

"Bitchy? I'm not bitchy…"

"Yes you are!" she said while looking exasperated at the fact that Rukia didn't see her actions as irritable, "You've been needlessly violent ever since we got let out of school early because of those psycho's."

"No I haven't!" Rukia crossed her arms and huffed grumpily, and as slow as Ichiko had been as a guy her time as a female had sharpened her senses and she managed to make the link easily enough.

"It's because they destroyed your drawing isn't it?"

"Not it isn't! Why would I be angry that they destroyed my unfinished…beautiful…amazing sketch…" Ichiko could see that Rukia was almost in tears over the fact, so she decided to unwittingly exercise the kind of unthinking apathy that only men can achieve.

"Yeah you're right, it was kinda crappy."

The elevator rocked a little on its cable under the force of face hitting wall.

* * *

"Y'know, this place isn't as weird as you made it out to be," Ichiko mumbled through the new wad of tissue she was holding to her nose, which was now leaking more blood than the walls of a house in a B-Movie horror, "You made it out to be some kind of horror movie mad scientist's lab where we'd find people being tortured and weird creatures in cages. It seems pretty normal to me." Rukia nodded slowly in agreement and held her chin ponderously.

"I don't get it; usually it's weirder than this…."

They both felt themselves become a little heavier as their inertia pushed them into the floor of the slowing lift, and with a cheery ping it came to a halt.

As the metal doors slid open Rukia and Ichiko's faces turned into mixed expressions of stunned confusion, surprise, interest and good ol' fashion horror.

As they looked out of the increasing gap they saw a scene of complete chaos, people were running around a wide corridor brandishing zanpakutos, odd scientific instruments, and what Ichiko guessed were some kind of other weaponry.

From around a corner further up the corridor there came a horrendous bestial roar which sent the panicked crowd of Shinigami running for cover, but one of them was not fast enough and a giant transparent blue tentacle shot out from the other corridor and wrapped around him, and began smashing him against the walls and ceiling like a rag doll while his colleges doused the freakish appendage with flame-throwers and whatever else they had in their arsenal.

A woman stumbled around the corner ablaze and noticed the open lift and began to lurch towards it while she screamed for help, the sight of her shook Rukia from her daze and she quickly began jamming the doors close button, and thankfully they shut just as the woman reached them.

"Oh…er… we had the wrong floor." She said weakly as she hit the right button and the muffled sounds of pounding and screaming faded away above them.

"I retract my previous statement…" said Ichiko distantly as she tried to take in what she'd just seen.

* * *

Some time later the elevator finally came to a halt on the correct floor and by then both the Shinigami had recovered their composure and Ichiko's nose had finally stopped bleeding which she partially attributed to all the blood rushing from her face at the sight of a crisping human torch.

"Oh good, we're still early." Rukia said with a bit more cheer than before and stepped out of the lift after making sure her visitor badge was pinned onto her shihakushō. Ichiko followed her out although she made sure to look all around first, this time she felt her earlier paranoia was justified, seeing as though she didn't want to be used as a gavel by Judge Tentacle.

"This way," Rukia said, already half way down the corridor, "And be sure to wear your guest pass."

Ichiko looked at the piece of plastic and wrinkled her nose at it. In an outfit where the edges were this close to her nipples she _really_ didn't want to subject them to a clip that was alive and eager to bite anything that went near them.

"I'll just get it out if anyone asks…" she said putting it into her pocket and stepping out into the rather dark corridor.

Rukia walked most of the way to the end and turned around to look for her companion who was still taking apprehensive steps along the corridor.

"Will you hurry up? This is where we're meant to go!"

Ichiko hurried a little but still kept looking around for any hint of booby-traps or big holes which an R-rated Tentacle might be able to slip through, but her investigation went unrewarded, but true to Sod's Law Ichiko hadn't 'seen the forest for the trees' as the saying goes, and as she'd been looking for danger in the smallest of places she'd missed the threat in the biggest.

"PUT DOWN YOUR WEAPON!" boomed a synthesised voice from the shadowy corridor just up ahead of where they stood, and as Ichiko jumped and looked up she suddenly saw the hulking figure of a giant robot that lifted itself up on backwards joined legs until it nearly filled the corridor, "YOU HAVE TWENTY SECONDS TO COMPLY!"

"W-what the hell is that?!" Ichiko yelped as she looked up at the ED-209. The shock of there being a metal killing machine in a corridor and the confusion of how she'd missed the 12ft tall monstrosity paralysed her for a moment so she didn't even consider drawing her zanpakuto.

"YOU HAVE 10 SECONDS TO COMPLY!" the obscenely large calibre guns attached to either side of its body clacked as they got ready to fire.

"I told you to wear your pass." Said Rukia, seemingly unconcerned by the threat of being torn to ribbons by a hail of hot lead… or whatever anti-spirit ammunition the psychotic Mayuri had thought to load it up with.

"8…7….6…." Ichiko fumbled around as she tried to pull the pass from her pocket, but her nerves made the simple action incredibly complicated, "4….3….2….1"

As the count-down ended the guns began to cycle and the unit braced for the recoil…which never came… instead the unit started to whir like a broken washing machine, and after a few disturbing pinging sounds, sank to the ground where it ineffectually burst into flames.

A confused Rukia and a terrified Ichiko both stared at the now crisping robot for a minute before their silence was broken by the opening of a door.

"Ah, Kuchiki-san," said Nemu in her usual bland voice as she poked her head out of the door, "You're early, please come in."

"Er…w-what the hell just happened?" Ichiko asked weakly as she finally found the strength to move her shaking legs. Nemu looked over at the robot then back to Ichiko and smiled slightly.

"Oh, that? It was meant to be a sort of 'guard dog' for Mayuri-sama's office, but he determined that anyone strong enough to get down here without permission wouldn't be troubled by a robot like this, no matter how strong the weaponry… so he just keeps the unfinished model here to scare idiots."

The passive insult drifted over the still shaken Ichiko's head, although Rukia definitely got a smile out of it, and after another needlessly violent push the strawberry girl was herded into the Captain's office after Nemu.

* * *

Once she had come back to her senses Ichiko was awed by the sheer chaotic mess of the taicho's office. Various machines of unknown design and purpose hummed noisily, wires snaked their way around the floor and dangled from the ceiling and the far end of the room was dominated by Mayuri's paper choked desk and a colossal bank of monitors.

The 12th Division captain was sat in a large leather chair, his back turned to them, only his arm visible pointing a remote control to the monitors.

"Please wait here," Nemu droned politely as they stepped into Mayuri's inner sanctum. Ichiko and Rukia waited by the door as Nemu approached her creator. As she bent to whisper to him music suddenly began to thrum from somewhere near the chair, causing Mayuri to raise one hand to silence Nemu before she had a chance to speak, and raise the other to point the remote towards the ceiling and jab at several buttons.

Servos whined loudly as a mechanical claw similar to the ones found in arcade machines descended from between two retracting tiles, carrying a bizarre piece of headgear. Ichiko couldn't see the (for lack of a better word) 'hat' as it set on Mayuri's head. This was followed by the sound of vented steam and screws being tightened by a power drill. The chair turned to revealed the the mentally unbalanced 12th captain, who looked like a strange cross between a Pharaoh and Huggy Bear.

Ichiko tilted her head slightly as she recognised the deep, ominous music that had been playing the whole time and whispered to Rukia.

"Is that the Imperial Death March?"

"I think you're right."

"First Buffalo Bill and now Darth Vader, why do scientists always have to be _mad_? Why can't they be cheery for once?"

Before Rukia could answer the music stopped and both of them looked up to see Mayuri answering his phone, which the music had presumably been the ring tone for.

"Hello?... No no, I'm not busy.... uh huh... uh huh... well we'll just have to fill the gap with something.... Ok hit me with it... uh huh... No no no! That's far too much personality for a filler character.... hm.... tell you what, just stick in some lightweight generic guy as a new 3rd Captain.... and give him a tuning fork as a weapon..." Mayuri rested back in his chair and began curling the phone cord around his finger like a teenage girl talking to her friend, "yea... Huh? An Aizen-Aporro love child as a 3rd Seat? Excellent idea! And be sure to cut the animation budget in half... yup... uh huh..."

When Mayuri finally looked up he noticed a very confused and worried looking pair of female Shinigami stood in his office, and seeing as though he was still full clothed he gathered their expressions of bemused intrigue were related to his conversation.

"Er... listen, I'll have to call you back, my five o'clock is here... yeah... get to work on those changes and er... yeah..." he hastily hung up the phone and tapped his heel twice on the chair, causing it to raise a little and begin to move towards Rukia and Ichiko on what looked like thousands of tiny human-like legs.

"Kuchiki Rukia... you're early..." Mayuri peered around Rukia quizzically, seeming to ignore Ichiko all together, "... you said this appointment was concerning that substitute upstart, Kurosaki... as you might know I'm no stranger to abstract thinking, but not bringing the person you wish me to examine is a little abstract even for me."

"M-Mayuri-taicho," Rukia stammered uncomfortably, which was a natural reaction when confronted with the freak of nature and/or science that was Mayuri... whether science or nature turned Mayuri into an oddball was a totally different line of study, one which is best left alone... but I digress, back to the story, "THIS... is Kurosaki Ichigo."

Mayuri slowly craned his neck round to look at the fledgling female and stared into her eyes in a very invasive manner for a long moment, before nature took its course and his eyes naturally dropped to her chest. Once again Ichiko cursed whatever invisible power made her shihakushō so revealing.

"...If you want to reverse a sex change then you're better off wasting the 4th Captain's time, not mine."

"For the last time!" snapped Ichiko, "I! DID! NOT! HAVE! A! SEX! CHANGE!"

Rukia restrained the raging red-head and smiled apologetically at Mayuri.

"Ichiko didn't have a sex change, it was an odd powder that did this to her."

Mayuri gestured dismissively and turned his chair away from them slowly.

"That's what you get for messing with science. You can leave now, I've no interest in such mediocre mysteries." Ichiko's heart sank along with her rage as she realised that a potential way of turning her back to normal was slipping away quickly, and she shot Rukia a pleading glance.

Rukia thought quickly and blurted out the first thing that came to mind.

"It was Urahara that made the powder!" Mayuri's chair halted and he very slowly looked up at them, he watched them for some time to make sure that they weren't lying and then stroked the odd protrusion on his chin.

"Urahara you say... Pshaw! If it is his doing then you can just go and ask him for help." the chair began to walk away again.

"H-he can't solve it!" Rukia said desperately but Mayuri just gestured disinterestedly over his shoulder.

"He always was an amateur."

Ichiko cursed under her breath as Mayuri signalled for Nemu to show them the way out, but before she reached them a brilliant idea hit her like a cow hitting the front of a drunkard's car: Messily, Heavily and with a great deal of odd satisfaction.

"We should go Rukia," she said a little louder than normal, "Urahara was right, this crackpot can't help me." she gestured subtly for Rukia to play along, but like the aforementioned cow it took her a while to realise what was happening.

"Yeah, you're right, we should have listened when he said that it wasn't a good idea to come to the SECOND BEST scientist in Soul Society."

Mayuri's chair screeched to a halt (which confused Ichiko as it had only been moving at 1mph) and Mayuri looked at them over his shoulder with a face like bottled thunder... or an angry clown who'd been out in the rain... it was hard to say.

"He said WHAT?!" the Science Pharaoh screeched in an uncomfortable pitch that Ichiko associated with the time Karin had hit her in the nuts with a baseball bat for shaving her head one night.

"Actually he said 'Mayuri's a crap scientist.' not 'WHAT?!'."

"Very funny, chuckles! Well seeing as though that clown messed up with one of his experiments, I SUPPOSE I can help out his joker lackeys, even if it is just to prove that he never was, is or will be even HALF the scientist I-"

"Think you are?" Interrupted Ichiko with a sly grin.

"-think I am!... Wait a minute!"

* * *

After Nemu had managed to calm Mayuri down from the trading of childish insults that followed, and Rukia had pummelled an unsuspecting Ichiko for nearly ruining her chance of a cure, they all got down to business.

"Well my lab is pretty packed at the moment, but I guess I could free up a containment tube for the duration of your stay... rest assured that all my instruments are sterile and you'll not need to worry about your limbs getting infected while they're away from you."

"Er... I may be asking for your help, but you can shove that pointy chin up your arse if you think that I'm going to let you be the first man to go inside of me in any sense of the term."

Mayuri threw his hands up in frustration and paced up and down his office, or to be more precise he allowed the chair he was sat on pace up and down for him.

"How am I meant to do ANY kind of decent research if you won't let me tear you limb from limb in the kind of gory display that college frat boys and Methodists find sexually exciting?"

Everyone in the room stared at Mayuri with a worried and sceptical expression.

"...I-it's in the name of science..."

"Sure it is... what kind of research can you do that doesn't involve anything even remotely lethal?"

Mayuri slumped in his chair like a moody child who'd just been told he couldn't have a cookie, and sighed in resignation.

"I guess I could work with samples of your skin, hair, saliva, stool, urine and blood.... but I'll warn you now, with such meagre... and boring... samples to go off my research will probably be slow and very unlikely to turn up anything." he clicked his fingers and Nemu brought over a tray of various instruments and assorted containers.

"Go with Nemu and she'll take all the relevant samples."

---Sometime later---

It had taken a while for Rukia to convince Ichiko it was safe to go with the 12th's Lieutenant after Ichiko had seen the twisted looking torture device which Mayuri assured them was nothing more than a syringe for taking a blood sample, but after some reassuring talk and the careful application of a crowbar to peal her off the ceiling, Ichiko had gone along with the deadpan fukutaicho.

"So... Mayuri-taicho..." Mayuri sighed to himself as he knew something he wasn't going to like was about to be asked, "...could I ask you a favour?"

"No, Kuchiki, you cannot." he said in a fed up tone.

"When you find a cure for Ichiko, do you think you could... alter it...?" she carried on regardless of the Captain's protest.

"Dare I ask what modification you would require me to make?"

"Well... Ichigo had no breasts at all... right?" Rukia began slowly.

"As is normal for a boy his age who keeps fit... I'm failing to see how this is relating to anything."

"Well... Ichiko has quite big breasts... right?"

"Unfortunately now I think I can see where this is going, so allow me to save you the time... if you want bigger boobs, go to Unohana. If you want me to turn them into machine-guns, or graft drills onto them, then I'm your guy, if you just want a bigger rack them bugger off to 4th-" suddenly a hand appeared in front of Mayuri's face holding one of the samples, but he couldn't place his finger on what the hell the deep orange liquid inside the container was meant to be, "... What is this?"

Ichiko looked away with an embarrassed expression and coughed uncomfortably.

"It's er... a urine sample..."

Mayuri took the container and examined it a bit closer.

"It's orange... why is it orange? Has it been like this since the change?"

"No no... just since Rukia began punching me in the kidneys..."

Mayuri looked up at Ichiko with what she thought was a genuine look of sympathy then looked back down at the container.

"Well... if it's blood and urine... I suppose you'll be spared the syringe. Oh, and I advise you swing by the 4th Division before you leave and speak to the Psychologist."

"The Psychologist?" Rukia looked up at Ichiko then back down at Mayuri. "The change hasn't messed her up that badly has it?"

"No, it hasn't, the psychologist is for YOU Kuchiki, you need to work out your anger issues before you turn any other of this speci-...er... girl's organs to pulp."

"Anger issues?!" Rukia flushed red with a mix of embarrassment and rage but Ichiko put a hand on her shoulder to stop her from doing anything rash.

"Er... is there anything else you need from me?"

"No no... that should be fine... for now..." Mayuri grumbled as he went back to his paper work and whistled for Nemu to show them out.

* * *

As they headed out of the lab Nemu started collecting the samples onto a tray.

"What should I do with these, Mayuri-sama?"

"Put them over there for now."

"And the video-tape of Kurosaki's pelvic exam." Rukia and Ichiko stopped dead in the doorway and slowly turned back to look at a rather panicked looking Mayuri.

"...Why did you record my pelvic exam?"

Mayuri fidgeted uncomfortably for a few moments then suddenly blurted, "FOR SCIENCE! YOU WOULDN'T UNDERSTAND! GET OUT!...."

"O-Ok..." Ichiko watched the statue-still and sweating Mayuri cautiously as she left the room and tried to put the whole thing from her mind.

After he was sure they were gone Mayuri recovered his composure and stood from his desk.

"Nemu, load up the projector... I have SCIENCE to conduct..."

"Of course, Mayuri-sama, I'll get the tissues... of science..."

**-----===Picture Book, Golden!===------**

The evening sky was nice and peaceful, not a single cloud could be seen for miles and the stars shone beautifully for all to see.... or at least they would have done if it wasn't for the billowing pillar of thick black smoke rising from the burning remains of a house in the centre of Karakura town.

While fire-fighters desperately fought to get the blaze under control, two rather sheepish and charred men stood in the street silhouetted against the flames as the Fire Chief came over to speak to them.

"You two again..." he said with a resigned sigh, "What happened this time?"

"It was the microwave..." offered Grimmjow who was once again trying to come to terms with the loss of his arm, which currently consisted of a blackened section of fake bone poking out of from under his singed sleeve.

"The microwave..." repeated the fire chief.

"Yeah... it fell down the stairs..."

Ulquiorra winced as Grimmjow repeated the same lie as last time. Evidently he'd forgotten what Ulquiorra had said about blaming it on faulty electrics, but his mind had become too preoccupied with the mourning the loss of his arm and he hadn't been paying much attention to his senior. A sympathetic soul would forgive him this small mistake, but Ulquiorra wasn't sympathetic... _ever._

"It fell down the stairs... just like the fridge?"

"Just like it." Ulquiorra decided that seeing as though Grimmjow had started them off on their road to falsehood, he may as well go along with it, after all if the Fire Chief got too suspicious he could just kill him and throw him on the blaze... then come back later for the tasty end product.

"So it had nothing to do with the fact that there was a camp fire under the microwave which appears to have been lit and burnt through the bottom, and then spread to the rest of the house?" Ulquiorra's eye twitched slightly, he hadn't expected the firemen to pin point the cause of the fire so quickly.

"We thought it'd cook quick-" Ulquiorra elbowed Grimmjow in the stomach harshly to shut him up.

"Must have happened at the bottom of the stairs." he blurted out.

"...but it was in the kitchen."

"It probably felt stupid for falling and climbed back up." Inside his mind Ulquiorra was slamming his head against a wall. When had he become host to such retarded excuses and ideas? Was this the effect of a Gigai? Or maybe he'd just been around Yammy for too long.

Ulquiorra wished he could stop this absurd and illogical chain of excuses, but just like a fat, drunken Texan oil baron, it was rolling down hill and gathering speed.

"Right, fine, whatever, I want to get this wrapped up as soon as possible so I can get home, so for the sake of argument I'll believe your story, so you're free to go."

Ulquiorra and Grimmjow sighed in relief and picked up their bags that they'd managed to rescue from the inferno.

The Chief stopped abruptly and turned back to the two Espada, "Oh, guys, one piece of advice."

"Er... yes?" Grimmjow said, getting a little worried.

"If you're going to move anywhere else that has appliances, make sure it has no fucking stairs."


	10. Chapter 10: Late Night Sneaky Hollow

**Author's Notes:** Just like with 9, this one was a struggle, had to write and rewrite the same bits over and over, and although it's not quite what I wanted it to be I decided to post it anyway, if I messed with it any more I'd end up scrapping the entire thing, so it's best for me to put it out there and try and make up for short comings with future chapters.

* * *

Thanks again to everyone who's been expressing interest in the story even after the stupidly long break, and thanks as always to Von Doomsatan for hassling me to finish it every night.

It was late when the Senkai reopened, late enough for most of the light to have faded and dark enough for the light of the tunnel to cast the street in quite artistic relief.

It was a picturesque scene deserving of being put to canvas, but like all paintings it had it's own version of the drunken critic that spoils it by vomiting on the canvas and passing out in the gallery.

In this case the 'drunken critic' was Kuchiki Rukia, the vomit was a badly off-key song, and the passing out was yet to come.

"Shooooow meee the waaaay to goooo hooooome, i'm tiiiired and I wanna go to beeeed. I had a cocktail of drugs about an hoooour agoooo and it's gone right to my-"

_Ah... There's the passing out._

Ichiko struggled to support a heavily sedated Rukia as she slouched on her shoulder and muttered incoherently. It was an odd state of affairs but considering the volatile mood Rukia had been in before, dragging her around was much more preferable to more of Ichiko's internal organs being badly bruised.

"Oh man... why did Unohana have to give you so many mood stabilizers?" Ichiko took a minute to jiggle the limp Shinigami into a more comfortable position, but Rukia squirmed at the mention of the 4th Captain and growled in a slurred manner, making her sound like a broken washing machine.

"Daaaaamn that... Unohana..." she grumbled while attempting to shake her fist, "Next time... i'll.... i'll...."

"Ah... that was why..." Ichiko was reminded of the rage Rukia got into when Unohana accused her of being jealous of Ichiko's boobs. It'd taken seven Shinigami to hold her down, and poor Hanataro had received a broken nose while trying to administer an injection.

"Geez... if only you could get that angry during a fight I wouldn't have to keep saving your non-existent ass."

"I've been told I have a rather nice arse!" Rukia protested at the ground.

"Really? Who was so lacking in taste to make that statement?" Ichiko thought it was worth having some fun with Rukia's inability to distinguish insults.

"Renji! That's who."

"Pfft... figures... he thinks Zabimaru has a nice arse."

"Zabimaru DOES have a nice arse!"

"Okay, you're definitely in loopy land right now." Ichiko picked up Rukia and threw her over her shoulder in a fireman's carry. There was no way she was going to be able to walk on her own, "Lets get you home before you start confessing anything you'll regret, or before you think the trees are talking to you."

"The sky has a mouth!" She was beginning to sound like a hippy from Woodstock, "It's so beauuuuutifuuuul!"

"Really? Uh-huh, that's nice." this was going to be a long walk home. Ichiko was tired, both physically and mentally and really wasn't in the mood for this shit thanks to having her last hope for change being shot down by the Bill Nye of Soul Society.

"Are you listening?!" Rukia feebly elbowed Ichiko in the head. Not hard enough to hurt but enough to annoy. It looked like humouring her was the only way to get a semi-peaceful journey home.

"Yeah yeah... Mouth in the sky... what's it saying?"

"Panties!"

Ichiko suddenly stopped and turned her head.

"What?!"

"It said panties!" Rukia sounded very sure of herself despite the drugs, "Listen!"

Ichiko listened carefully, wondering why her stomach was doing flip-flops at such a simple word as 'Panties'. The shopping trip hadn't affected her that bad had it?

Ichiko listened for a long moment before she finally heard the familiar sound of Styrofoam being rubbed and torn. It was the sound of reality being forced aside, and she knew even before she looked up that a gargant had opened and a hollow was coming out.

Ichiko's eyes slowly turned upwards towards the tear, and what she saw froze the blood in her veins.

"I-It can't be..." she stammered feebly.

It was.

"PANTIEEEES!" the Hollow bellowed as it spotted the two women and dropped down with a earth shaking thud in front of them.

"Didn't Toshiro kill you?!" She looked the Hollow up and down and then quirked an eyebrow, "Oh you've got to be kidding me... who the hell made you an Arrancar?!" Ichiko moved back slowly towards cover, so she could put Rukia somewhere safe and get ready to fight.

"Shiro-chaaaan didn't kill the pervy Hollow," chimed in Rukia, "He hurt it, but it ran away before he could finish it off."

"Great..." Ichiko put Rukia behind a corner of the intersection they were at and drew Zangetsu. She dropped into the fighting stance that Matsumoto had shown her briefly and tried to remember the tips she gave her. In the short while that she had been able to practice the new fighting style, she had been able to find a way to return most of the weight to her strikes that had been taken by the need to alter her grip and movements.

"You're going down this time for sure. I'm not as unprepared as last time."

"Aizen-sama gave me a bigga bag and took my mask off, so I can carry more swwwwwwweet panties and mmmmmmm sniff dem all da betta!" the Panty Thief Arrancar licked its lips obscenely with its freshly regrown tongue and got ready to strike with its long, spindly fingers.

* * *

Ichiko struck first, running forward between the Arrancar's hands before it could try to grab her and aimed a lateral slice at the Hollow's stomach, but the monster was quick and shot out its tongue at the nearest building, and used it like a winch to drag itself away from the sweeping arc of Zangetsu.

The Thief pushed off of the building as soon as it reached it, launching itself in whirling mass of grasping digits at Ichiko, but she managed to bat the hands apart with her blade and brought the blade back down in a diagonal cut across it's mask, but it kicked off the ground and back into the air like some kind of gigantic frog, making the tip of Zangetsu barely nick the smooth white of the remaining jaw of its mask.

"Damnit! Make this easy on yourself and keep still!" yelled the redhead as she jumped high into the air, following her adversary with an upwards stroke that she knew wouldn't connect, but would drive it downwards, and right on cue it shifted and leapt down towards the street, closely followed by a blue-white flash of light and a cry of 'Getsuga Tensho!', but the blast missed and instead just carved a deep gouge in the road surface, and the monster disappeared from sight in the resulting cloud of debris.

"Damn it! Why are my reactions so slow! I'm faster than this!" Ichiko had to admit that her limbs felt heavier than usual, and it wasn't down to fatigue generated by a long and annoying day. She had been through worse and still fought better, but now she felt like weights had been attached to her limbs, and even her mouth felt sluggish as she had shouted the name of her attack.

"_Hey there, partner. What's the problem?"_

The voice seemed to come from all around her, but she knew it was just in her head.

"You!" she hissed through gritted teeth.

"_What's wrong? Not pleased to hear from me again? You look like you're having some problems fighting. Maybe you should let ME take over for a while!"_

"T-The hell I will!" so that was it, her inner Hollow was slowing her down, like she had during her first encounter with the Espada at the crater. She had nearly gotten Ichiko killed that day for the sake of amusement and making a point. This was definitely not a good time for her to try the same thing again.

"_Now that creates a real problem,"_ Hichiko snickered, _"Because I'm really in the mood for some fun, and you being a party pooper isn't helping."_

"Can't you get your jollies some other way?" there was a flash of movement in the corner of Ichiko's eye and she turned to face it just in time to see the Panty Thief leaping towards her with arms out stretched with an easy to exploit opening just perfect for a killing stroke.

Just another moment and she'd finish off the freak.

"_I've got an idea! Why don't I let this guy... 'get you in the mood'. Maybe you'll be more inclined to play after he's had his way! HAHAHAHAHAHA!"_

The previous weight of Ichiko's limbs was nothing compared to what she felt now. It was as if she had chains attached to her limbs and each one had one of the protection squads hauling it against her movements.

"D-Damn it!" she stammered as she fought to get Zangetsu up in time. Her chance for a strike was gone, all she could hope for now was to block the worst of the blow.

The Arrancar slammed into Ichiko with considerable force, and dropped her from the sky like a bird at a hunt.

Ichiko struggled to move but couldn't stand, she felt as if an elephant was stood on her chest, holding her down in the small crater that had been formed in the road from her impact.

"S-Stop this!" she stammered, "This isn't the time for your games! You'll get us killed!"

"_Ooooh no I won't, I know you'll have to give into me eventually, and when you do I won't be so easy to shake from the saddle as last time, cowboy!" _The insane laughter made Ichiko sick to her stomach as she looked up at the Arrancar towering over her, ready to do it's worst.

"_So what'll it be? Keep your pride but let this thing do the dirty with you? Or save your womanhood and let me paint the streets with its BLOOD?!"_

"I won't give in...!" Ichiko's reply was feeble as her arms refused to move so much as an inch. No matter how hard she tried she couldn't lift her zanpakuto, and the Panty Thief was salivating profusely in anticipation as its long fingers began to slowly open up her already very revealing kimono.

"Mmmmm you still smell frrrrrrresh!"

"No...! Not like this!" Ichiko had never felt so afraid in her life. She was trapped between a rock and a hard place, both as bad as each other and she was about to be crushed between them.

Her salvation arrived not a moment too soon, and it arrived in the form of a flutter of shining pink.

The Panty Thief howled in pain as the hand that was probing Ichiko's kimono exploded into thousands of time fragments, and the beast reeled back as it sought out the location of its new assailant.

"Wot is dis?! Who dere?!" it raged as it's exposed brow furrowed in anger. It's answer was a flash of steel across its other arm, severing the limp clean off, but before it could howl again another strike cut it clean down the centre of its mask.

Ichiko followed the line of the strike downwards and caught sight of a figure in a white hoari as it sheathed its blade.

"_Hmph!" _grumbled Hichiko from the recesses of her mind, _"Looks like my fun is over for now... but don't think you're rid of me... you WILL be mine..."_

Slowly the weight lifted from Ichiko's limbs, but she didn't move, instead she laid still trying to catch her breath as her chest became lighter, and watched her saviour as he turned towards her.

"B-Byakuya?!" she stammered in exhaustion, noticing the distinctive hairpiece and neck scarf of the stern faced Taicho.

Byakuya ignored her, much to Ichiko's chagrin and instead walked past her to check on Rukia, who had been too out of it to help, and despite the danger of the last few minutes was happily talking to a moth that was fluttering near by.

"Are you alright?" Byakuya asked his sister as he knelt beside her with an uncharacteristic look of concern on his face.

"Niiiii-samaaaaa!" she said cheerfully as the moth landed on her upturned palm.

He wasn't sure if she was talking to him or the moth.

"I'm fiiiiiine, I'm fiiiiine. It's good to see you again." Byakuya raised an eyebrow as Rukia began making kissing noises at the moth.

"You don't sound fine. What happened to yo....u..." Rukia ate the moth. Byakuya looked mortified.

* * *

Byakuya turned his eye to Ichiko with a venomous look that she couldn't help but feel was designed especially for her. He seemed to pull it out whenever they met, which not surprisingly was whenever she and Rukia got into trouble together.

"What have you do to her?" he intoned dangerously, "I saw you leaving the 4th Division together, what did you do to her?"

"Wha-? Me? I didn't do anything! Captain Unohana gave her the sedative. Don't be so quick to point the finger!" Ichiko shifted in the rubble of the crater to try and get up but didn't succeed.

"Oh, and I'm fine too, thanks for asking." she added sarcastically.

"You're not from my squad so your well-being is none of my concern." he said flatly, and Ichiko couldn't help but think that he wouldn't have cared even if she was from the 6th.

"Who are you and what squad are you from? No one other than Rukia and that reprobate Kurosaki were authorised to go through the Senkai, I'll be sure to report your unauthorised absence to your Captain." he seemed to be taking too much pleasure from the prospect of seeing an underling be punished. Was this his way of protecting Rukia? If it was Ichiko hoped he would go back to not giving a shit.

Rukia suddenly sat up and laughed heartily like that idiot ghost hunter and clapped her brother on the shoulder in a way she never would have dreamed of doing if she had been in possession of her wits.

"Oh Nii-sama, that IS that reprobate Kurosaki-chan!" she slurred cheerily before flopping back down.

Byakuya stayed silent for a while, evidently trying to summarise whether she was talking complete bollocks or if the sentence had had a hidden meaning, but when he looked up with a cocked brow at the prone red head who still lay in the crater, he noticed the similarities and the look of bafflement turned into an expression usually reserved for when one man walks in on another man dancing around in women's underwear.

Ichiko could have refuted the fact, she could have told Byakuya that Rukia was completely delusional and that she just happened to look like Ichigo and was no real relation, god knows Byakuya was one of the last people she wanted to know about her predicament, but as she opened her mouth she realised that he was beyond convincing, and so she ended up blurting out something that at the time seemed like something that really needed to be cleared up.

"I didn't have an operation!"

* * *

A while later all three of them were back at the Kurosaki house hold, which thankfully was empty. Her father had agreed to cover the night shift at the hospital and her sisters had gone to their friends houses for the night, leaving the three Shinigami to suffer through their uncomfortable silence in relative peace.

Byakuya had originally only come along to carry the still insensible Rukia due to Ichiko being too beat up and tired to carry her, but he had ended up declaring that he was to spend the night in the 'quaint' house. He didn't say why but to Ichiko it was rather clear. Byakuya was possibly the only person to consider the fact that even though Ichiko's body had become that of a girl, his mind was still that of a boy, and as such he was still subject to the temptation of an inebriated woman sleeping in the same room, although nothing could have been further from Ichiko's mind even if she still had the equipment to take full advantage of the situation.

One thing that had surprised Ichiko was that despite being an over-privileged noble and aware that Ichiko was really a boy, he had taken the chivalrous route and volunteered to sleep on the floor instead of booting Ichiko out of her bed and claiming it for himself, but despite the apparent selflessness of this it still couldn't cover over one very disturbing fact.

_Ichiko had a very very very old half-naked man sleeping in the same room as her._

She wasn't sure if it would have been considered even worse if he had been a guy with a very very very old half-naked man sleeping in the same room as her, but either way this situation was loaded with potential danger like a truck stop sandwich... or a truck stop in general.

Ichiko had provided as many of the essentials for a stay over as she could, a futon, a toothbrush, and even a pair of her fathers pyjamas which Byakuya had stared at for several minutes as if expecting Ichiko to burst out laughing and say 'only joking' before handing him something suitable to wear, but when a punchline didn't materialise he accepted them without another word and went into the bathroom while Ichiko got herself ready for bed. Rukia had simply been deposited onto her bed as all attempts to undress her had resulting in varying degrees of flailing and accusations of a sexual nature. Ichiko was forced to admit that Byakuya's reaction had been funny as hell when Rukia suggested a game of hide the sausage. He'd never let her live that one down.

It was some time past midnight and Ichiko was still awake, her mind refused to shut down despite feeling like dead weight right now, and the dull ache in her limbs had faded to a blissful numbness but still her body was active as if expecting an attack from an unseen but somehow sensed predator.

Ichiko wished the unseen predator could have been a metaphor and nothing more, but it was real, it was a cancer inside of her that clawed at the casing of her mind, breaking that seal of sanity that kept it in check.

"_What's the matter, Partner? Can't sleep?"_ Ichiko didn't reply to the monochrome presence within her mind, _"I don't blame ya, must've been quite a blow to your confidence not being able to take down a pathetic excuse for a hollow like that one today. I'd be laying awake feeling sorry for myself too if it happened to me."_ Still she said nothing.

"_You just don't get it do you? You can't win against me. Every time you use your bankai, every time you draw on Zangetsu's strength you make it easier for me to get control of you. Every time you build up the strength to cut your enemy you cut yourself. Every time you burn their bodies with Getsuga Tensho you burn away your self-control... and I'll climb through those holes. I'll tear open your wounds, I'll lap at the blood and I'll keep feeding and tearing until there's nothing of left except for me!"_

"I won't let you..." Ichiko whispered to the ceiling, more to try and convince herself than the Hollow within.

"_Oh please, you don't have the strength! You're a coward! I was going to take things slow, take my time in tearing you apart, but I can't stand to see such a shit excuse for a Shinigami moping around! So I'm gonna start coming for you quicker, not just week by week, but day by day, hour by hour, and in no time you'll be mine!"_ the Hollow chuckled lightly, making the jovial expression sound like the last exhalations of a drowning child.

"_Don't believe me? Maybe I should demonstrate how easy you are to control."_

"What are you going to do? Stop me fighting again?" Ichiko furrowed her brow as she spoke aloud, the memories of her ruined battles came flooding back and she felt sickened for being driven so low when her friends needed to be defended.

There was that horrible laugh again.

"_Stop you fighting? Why would I wait for you to get into another scrap when I can have just as much fun here?!"_

Ichiko tried to think what her Hollow could mean. Was she going to attack Byakuya again? Was she going to try and settle her old score? Or maybe Hichiko would go after the defenceless Rukia.

"_Not quite."_ the Hollow laughed as it read her every thought, and gave her one of its own.

Ichiko's eyes opened wide in horror as it revealed its plan in a single image.

"You're not-!"

"_I am!"_ suddenly Ichiko's limbs became leaden as they had before, her entire body felt as if it would be crushed under its own weight, but a moment later the weight lifted completely and she felt as though the ties had been cut completely allowing her to float away from her body yet remain within it.

She fought to grasp the mental controls to her body, but Hichiko threw her away and slumped into the proverbial driver's seat.

* * *

Byakuya had slipped into a peaceful sleep despite being in a room with someone he didn't completely trust, but all concerns were washed away as wonderful dreams of a better time filled his mind.

It was a beautiful summer's evening, the heat of the day was diminishing as the sun began to dip towards the horizon and he and his wife sat together in the garden of his home drinking tea and simply enjoying each other's company.

They talked little but the silence was not uncomfortable, and as the sun dropped out of the sight and the servants lit the lamps in the garden Byakuya held Hisana in an affectionate and loving embrace that was for her and her alone.

Hisana looked up at her husband with a glimmer in her eyes that spoke of a thousand promises of pleasure, not a single one of which he could refuse, and without a word he picked her up and carried her to their bedroom.

Many would think that Byakuya was against such lude actions, even if they were performed in the name of love, but Byakuya, like many nobles, was only opposed to them being talked about openly or shown around. What happened behind closed doors was his own business, and when it came to Hisana _a lot_ happened behind closed doors.

This dream was one of his favourites, a mix of memory and fantasy, small details had been glazed over to make the scene perfect and every moment was an eternity of bliss... but something was wrong this time.

The first oddity was Hisana's touch, it some how... felt real this time, the next was that even though her hands moved to his shoulders the sensation of her touch stayed on his chest. The feeling of nails lightly being traced along the lines of his well toned chest, and down onto his abs was so pleasant, yet distracting too. His mind began to stir, and reluctantly his mind drifted away from the dream as it sought to locate the origin of this pleasurable touch.

* * *

Byakuya stretched a little as he slowly began to wake and moaned the name of his wife lightly, and eventually opened his eyes.

A woman sat straddling his waist, her hands teasing his torso tenderly as she planted tender kisses along his muscular chest.

"Hisana... that feels wonderful..." he mumbled with a sigh and gently stroked her hair... her short hair... Byakuya slowly looked down... her short _orange_ hair...

Kuchiki-Taicho was afraid of no man, but this woman turned his blood cold in terror.

"K-KUROSAKI!?" he blurted in shock.

"Come on Byakuya-cha~n, forget about your dear wife. She's gone, but I'm here, and I can give you everything she can't. I can do things to you she never could."

Byakuya flinched as Kurosaki looked up at him and grinned a grin that was filled with a thousand promises of forbidden pleasure, not a single one of which didn't terrify him.

He looked at her eyes and saw the familiar black orbs with their piercing yellow irises and flinched.

"You! You're not Kurosaki! You're-!" finally he recovered from his shock and quickly scrambled out from underneath her until he was trapped up against the wall behind him.

"What does it matter _who_ I am when _what_ I am is so much more interesting. And what I am is a girl who need a strong man like you to make her feel like a real woman!"

Hichiko crawled towards him on her hands and knees looking like a tigress stalking her prey, and as she got close she placed her finger on Byakuya's lips then slowly slid it down towards the waist band of his pants.

Byakuya panicked, his usual cool and calculating mind malfunctioned and he struck out on instinct, pushing Hichiko away as hard as she could.

She stumbled to her feet and hit the cupboard behind, but all she did was smile and giggle as he scrambled up the wall he was sat against.

"Wanna play rough, eh? Just the way I like it!" the possessed red-head leapt at Byakuya as he weighed his options.

He could pop a soul pill and attack her, but he knew that if he did it would become a fight where he would be forced to kill Kurosaki, and this time Kurosaki was not an intruder to be eliminated. He could try using Kido but he wasn't sure if a spell would be strong enough to stop the Hollow infested girl, and he definitely didn't have enough time to recite the full incantation, so that left Byakuya with one option.

Hichiko was within arm's reach and was laughing manically when Byakuya went for the emergency option and swung his foot upwards as hard as he could.

The blackness drained from Ichiko's eyes as she stopped dead in her tracks, her face drained of all colour too, and as Byakuya removed his foot from between Kurosaki's legs she dropped to her knee's whimpering.

"T-Thanks...!" she squeaked as she shivered in pain.

Byakuya stayed pressed against the wall for a few moments, unsure if this was a trick or if Kurosaki had really managed to regain control, but when she didn't move to try and grab him again he slowly knelt down and helped her back up onto her bed.

"I...wasn't sure if that worked on women." he said, unable to think of anything else to say.

"Oh... it works just fine..." Ichiko said wiping the tears from her eyes and fighting down the urge to vomit.

* * *

After Ichiko had regained feeling in her lower half and Byakuya had reasserted his iceman like façade they looked at each other uneasily, unsure how to address what had just happened.

"I'm... sorry..." Byakuya managed after a bit of an internal struggle.

Ichiko was a bit too distracted by what had happened to show surprise at his almost human show of regret.

"Me too..." she muttered in reply, not wanting to look him in the eye.

"How often does this happen?" Byakuya asked while looking towards his sister who despite the commotion hadn't stirred at all, and lay spread eagle on her bed snoring softly.

"More often since the Arrancar showed up..."

"You need to deal with it." he said sternly.

"I'm trying."

"Then try harder!" the burst of aggression from the 6th Captain caught Ichiko's attention and she turned to look at him and saw a look of deep concern on his face, but it wasn't for her, it was for Rukia, "I don't know what it is that you're struggling with, but you're losing, it's clear to see. Even when we first fought it took everything you had to regain control, and this time I had to literally beat it out of you. You need to find a way to control your problem or get rid of it... because as long as it runs loose Rukia will be in trouble. And I won't let your cowardice put her in danger."

Ichiko wanted to snap back at him, say that it wasn't cowardice, say that he had control, but it was all a lie. Byakuya was right, she was losing and it was putting everyone around her in danger. The last thing Soul Society or Karakura needed right now was an enemy within.

"Yeah..." was all she managed to say.

"Go, Ichiko... go and find a way to control this thing else where. I'll take care of things here, nothing will happen to your friends while Captain Hitsugaya and I are around. You're too much of a danger right now."

Ichiko got up off her bed and walked to her bedroom door, she didn't say anything but Byakuya's words had cut deep and she knew everything he said was true, but as if he knew he had been too harsh Byakuya spoke again before she could leave.

"As much as I hate to say it, you're strong, and stubborn. Even a reprobate like you should be able to beat this thing."

Ichiko raised an eyebrow, unsure if she was meant to be grateful or angry for that comment, but nodded all the same.

"One last thing." the Captain said after a little hesitation. Ichiko turned to look at him and for a moment it looked as if he was about to wish her good luck.

"Yes?" she urged quietly. He stood with his mouth open for a minute before looking away and reasserting his usual derogatory expression.

"You should probably get dressed before you leave."

Ichiko stared at him in puzzlement for a moment then followed his line of sight downwards when he gazed at her out of the corner of his eye.

"Son of a-!" she threw her arms around her chest when she finally realised that she'd been topless all this time.


End file.
